@ Pete_C
I find myself in sync quite often to what Pete_C has to say but I am hopeful that "cloud" is not the only part of Leviton's future plans. There is something to say for not having your house fall victim to the next generation ransomware. Imagine arriving home and the door won't unlock until you bitcoin the ransomware dealer who jacked your house automation while in the "cloud". Never had to worry about that with an HAI eprom chip upgrade.
Cloud-based systems can be less reliable that premise-based and with the cloud, changes are implemented without the user's consent, have requirements for uninterrupted Internet, and because of the "cloud" functionality, suffer in terms of performance and security.
Recurring revenue is important for most any business today; which the "cloud" provides for some. The fact though is that "cloud" is not needed to create recurring revenue and fact is Leviton could have created a "subscription" service at any time for owners to receive updates to their platform.
As Levition abandons their investment in HAI and releases "less than perfect" hardware accessories geared more toward Bitwise and less about HAI, they continue to show they don't have what it takes to compete in the fast evolving automation market. Leviton does however have some nice light switches, wall plates, and other basic manufactured products but don't seem to be keen on grasping at a large more complicated market. It would be "cool" [sorry Ano] to see Levition find a way to create a large revenue stream in making the world of Star Trek come alive in the modern home through automation. While the need to conserve electricity has fallen on appliance and bulb manufacturers, automation can generate a sizeable percentage of savings in terms of conservation and consumer and business expense without need of the cloud which means there is a large market for automation. Simply flipping the breaker on an unused water heater before leaving for work can save money, but having that task automated adds reliability, consistency, and a "real" savings. The same applies to any other task. Legislation at the government level to offer incentives to home owners, renters, and businesses for automation that matters would help drive the market. I would think a company like Leviton as a household name would have no problem getting listed as an approved automation Energy Star (or something like it) vendor. If toilets can be conservation certified, then why not automation. Our local city paid us to replace toilets in our home, paid to install a rain/freeze sensor, paid us to add more insulation and replace windows, as did the FED.
I have a newer OPII in my own home (no more eprom change outs needed). I dislike that the OPII is slow, so slow that I wonder if an event triggered. I dislike that there is no two-way SMS messaging control. I dislike that complex programming is not possible (if this then that else other) and some simple functions are non-existent. Back in the day, eprom chips were purchased by owners to upgrade their Omnipro - that was the start of a recurring revenue stream that HAI had established. It's already proven that Omni and Lumina owners will buy chips to upgrade. The ugly is that chips are static sensitive and less than convenient plus plugging/unplugging tends to stress circuit board traces and soldered connections of the sockets supporting them. The OPII with onboard upgrade capability was a great idea - too bad Leviton blew it by not offering future software upgrades at a price. A new OPIII (
please let there be an OPIII) based on today's tech would be phenomenal if just a few key items were addressed - btw... no problem paying for new hardware and the software maintenance program.
Leviton - why not offer a trade-up deal like many manufacturers do? Leviton could offer a simple upgrade program to replace existing systems and then again replace those systems in the future at "upgrade pricing" for those on active subscriptions, whereby upgrades are full price for those no on subscription. Tens of thousands of other manufacturers do this and I am surprised you [Levition] does not (in case they happen to read this post].
Yes - old tech like eprom-based controller boards do have to be replaced, but it would be nice to have a singular cabinet like exists with the OPII, where the entire board could be replaced with an OPII, OPIV, etc. every 5 years or so and no problem in paying for a subscribed software with benefits, similar to what exists with many hardware/software vendors today. Buy a high-end firewall for the office and it gets replaced every so often - that's a model that works and proven model. Services for the firewall are recurring revenue subscriptions that generate revenue and enable the manufacturer to offer a nexgen product. That works too. Eproms, upgradeable hardware, now lets see a true upgraded platform with new features. Dealers also generate revenue by performing upgrades, automating tasks the property owner doesn't understand or doesn't want to do; so this too is a win-win situation, without need of a tech to come out and install an eprom.
pete_c said:
Once you purchase an OmniPro 2; you own it. Leviton doesn't make any reoccurring revenue from it so they are losing money these days unless you sign up with their email cloud application. Elk and Leviton too will be probably shifting over to the cloud for reoccurring revenues.
