Last week IKEA officially took the wraps off their upcoming smart blinds system. However the announcement at that time was for the European market which meant that it was unclear if there were plans to eventually bring it stateside. The good news is that IKEA has since confirmed with Fast Company that they do plan to launch it in the US and will be doing so on the 1st of April, 2019.
Known as Fyrtur, this will be IKEA’s attempts at creating a smart blinds system for the home. Such systems aren’t exactly new but given IKEA’s approach at creating affordable furniture, this might have the advantage of being more affordable that the competition. The smart blinds system will also be compatible with HomeKit which means control using Siri, the HomePod, or the Home app.
It also means that users can buy into IKEA’s other smart products, such as their smart bulbs and create an entire ecosystem with IKEA products that can be controlled at the same time. The blinds themselves don’t require any wiring and will run on a rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which means that you will need to charge it from time to time. Also we imagine that with all lithium-ion batteries, it will eventually lose its charge so we’re not sure how long they can last for.
There is no word on how much the blinds will cost when they arrive stateside, but over in Europe they are priced between $113 to $181 depending on their size.
Filed in . Read more about Connected Objects, HomeKit, Ikea and IoT (Internet of Things).