involve more work from the user (e.g. DIY setup)? Does it provide them with
less personal (e.g. automated or lower bandwidth) customer service?
Figure 4.8: Lowes Iris Safe and Secure DIY home security kit (hub, motion
sensor, two contact sensors, alarm keypad). (Image: Lowes).
A niche entrant to an existing market
Augmenting an existing product type with connectivity and potentially
intelligence can create opportunities to address previously unmet user needs in
an existing market. It may target a niche with specialist interests: for example,
an energy monitoring system designed for those who generate their own
electricity and may sell it back to the grid. Or it may introduce a premium
product for those willing to pay more. The Nest thermostat offered the first
intelligent heating solution with high-end hardware and polished UX design in
a market previously dominated by ugly, unusable plastic boxes. This reshaped
consumer expectations of what a heating controller could be, even in the part
of the market that couldn’t or didn’t want to pay extra for a Nest.
Tools vs. products
For some specific connected devices, like a heating controller, there’s a close
mapping between function and value. It’s easy for people to understand what it
does. That’s not enough to make it a good heating controller. But it’s pretty