Apple HomeKit Automation Devices May Not Arrive Before Spring

Last year Apple showed off its home automation technology aptly called HomeKit. Device manufacturers will build home automation products that use this technology. A new report suggests that it may take until spring 2015 for these devices to hit the market. That will mark one full year since the announcement of HomeKit to the launch of the very first products to use it. HomeKit was unveiled at the Worldwide Developers Conference 2014 in San Francisco.

Sources tell Re/code that one of the reasons for this delay is the certification process not beginning on time. Apple had hope to get the HomeKit hardware certification process underway quicker but given that it sets high performance standards for hardware manufacturers that factor too has contributed to the delay. The report claims Apple didn’t even release specifications to chip makers until October 2014.

Some companies did show off their HomeKit enabled devices at the Consumer Electronics Show 2015 earlier this month but in most cases the finished products would be shipped out to customers until spring or summer 2015.

Clearly the goal for Apple here is to ensure that the HomeKit enabled devices provide a great user experience from the get go, not to bring devices to market as soon as possible, but for people who have been waiting for these devices it means having to wait even longer.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Gadgets
Tags: Connected Objects, HomeKit