Why Matter matters to Samsung, LG, Whirlpool and more
By Alan Wolf, YSN
Matter, a widely embraced protocol for connecting smart home products, has been updated to support six appliance categories.
The latest version, Matter 1.2, allows consumers to remotely control smart refrigerators, room air conditioners, dishwashers, clothes washers, robotic vacuums and air purifiers across multiple brands.
The open-source standard, released last year, represents the appliance industry’s most widely-adopted interoperable ecosystem. Early backers include Arçelik (Beko, Blomberg), Bosch, Carrier, Haier, LG, Midea, Miele, Samsung, The Home Depot and Whirlpool, as well as Amazon, Apple and Google.
According to the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA), Matter’s creators, the update brings “new layers of interoperability, simplicity, reliability and security while unlocking new use cases and features for the future.”
Whirlpool, which helped develop the new appliance specification, described the update as the first step toward bringing major appliances from the kitchen and laundry room into the Matter ecosystem. “The number of connected devices in homes is increasing,” said Murat Genc, Whirlpool’s global technology and data officer. “Our work to bring Matter support to Whirlpool Corp. appliances will improve the user experience with more interoperability across these devices.”
See: Whirlpool Connects with Matter
Thanks to Matter, “The sky’s the limit for how connected home appliances interact with the rest of the smart home,” added James Oh, Whirlpool’s vice president of product marketing. “As more home appliance categories are added in the future, the power and utility of IoT [the Internet of Things] will be at consumers’ fingertips.”
The company said the development of Matter 1.2 represented an “unprecedented collaboration among major home appliance manufacturers,” and pledged to continue working to bring the IP-based protocol to additional appliance categories and the entire Whirlpool Corp. brand portfolio.
