Wink, the Internet of Things software company that grew out of Quirky, has released their newest product, Relay. Photo: Wink
Wink, the Internet of Things software company that grew out of Quirky, has released their newest product, Relay.
Photo: Wink
Relay looks like a traditional light switch, but is actually a physical nerve center for connected gadgets that previously talked only to a smartphone app. Photo: Wink
Relay looks like a traditional light switch, but is actually a physical nerve center for connected gadgets that previously talked only to a smartphone app.
Photo: Wink
Users can control smart gadgets via customized profiles, on Relay’s screen or an app. This means one touch could effectively shut the house down for the night, by turning off the lights and locking the doors, or amp it up for a party, by dimming the lights and turning speakers on. Photo: Wink
Users can control smart gadgets via customized profiles, on Relay’s screen or an app. This means one touch could effectively shut the house down for the night, by turning off the lights and locking the doors, or amp it up for a party, by dimming the lights and turning speakers on.
Photo: Wink
It's a modular solution. As gadgets accumulate over time, they can be folded into Relay as well. Photo: Wink
It's a modular solution. As gadgets accumulate over time, they can be folded into Relay as well.
Photo: Wink
In their ongoing quest to “humanize the smart home,” as Matt McGovren, Wink’s head of marketing, puts it, the software company is disguising their newest product as a very familiar piece of hardware: the light switch.
At a glance Relay is a white light switch, with a screen. It would barely register a second glance from most houseguests. Only instead of just turning lights on and off, Relay syncs with connected home gadgets to simultaneously do things like lock the front door, bring the blinds down, turn on an alarm, and cool the thermostat—all on top of dimming the lights. It’s a physical nerve center for connected gadgets that previously talked only to a smartphone app.
“There’s lots of times where controlling this from the app makes more sense, but there’s also lots of times when you’re at home where your phone’s in your purse, or you run out the door, or you’re in your bedroom,” McGovren says. “Sometimes it’s much easier to reach over and tap a light switch like you would normally do.”
If you’re not familiar, Wink is the company that grew out of Quirky after more and more of Quirky’s creative community of inventors began submitting ideas for smart gadgets. They realized that making connected gizmos would require a connective software platform, so voilà: Wink was born. When Quirky partnered with GE last year (and netted $30 million from the company to do so), Wink began to grow as well.
Wink
Because of the GE partnership there are over 100 products on Home Depot shelves that are Wink-enabled. This includes light bulbs, door locks, garage doors, Nest thermostats, and the Aros smart air conditioning unit, to name but a few. (If diehard users want to loop in products that use newer connectivity technologies, like Z-Way or Zigbee, they can also get Hub, a product Quirky rolled out earlier this summer that translates those into Wi-Fi or Bluetooth.) Relay, which is Android-powered, can talk to all of them, individually or via customized profiles the homeowner creates using either Relay’s screen or an app. This means one touch could effectively shut the house down for the night, by turning off the lights and locking the doors, or amp it up for a party, by dimming the lights and turning speakers on. As gadgets accumulate over time, they can be folded into Relay as well.
Making the Internet of Things both convenient and modular is how Quirky and Wink believe they’ll win over customers: “They’re getting products because they wish they knew when their kids got home from school, or they want to save money on their energy bill,” McGovern says. “That’s how people are starting to adopt these products, a couple at a time. It isn’t this big daunting thing you do overnight.”
The new product is also symbolically significant for Quirky, a company who has joined forces with a corporate behemoth, but was founded on a design ethos rooted in community input. By wiring together a hub for many disparate devices that will likely use different technologies to power up, they’re making an inclusive product. And by anchoring it on the wall, in the home, they’re staking out long term territory. That’s a vote of confidence in future products that Quirky’s community could dream up to connect to Relay.
Relay will cost $249, and is available for pre-sale on Amazon.
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