So where can a telco fit into all of this? After all, these are the same companies who spent a decade trying to limit their truck rolls and to move their entire DSL business to self-install. Are telcos going to start stocking all sorts of automation device SKUs and come out and do installs and set ups? Probably not.

Where I see the role of the telco here is primarily on the software and services layer, providing a platform to broker communications and control signals between and amongst devices in the home. This fits well into the three screens concept (TV, browser, mobile phone) that all carriers have been pushing for a while – allowing their customers to control devices and services in their home locally on the TV/set top box interface, and anywhere using a PC or mobile device.

These control services could range from the traditional -- “turn on my front lights” or “set my DVR to record 24 – to the more futuristic. One example would be “independent living” services which provide monitoring services for elderly folks living on their own. The actual in-home systems and networks to be controlled could be self-installed by the customer – for example, Z-Wave lighting controllers – or provided by a third party, such as the installation of a home monitoring system. And there’s no reason why everything to be controlled would have to be on a single network: There could be Wi-Fi cameras connected to the residential gateway, Z-Wave automation controllers, set top boxes connected via MoCA and even mobile devices communicating through a femtocell.

The carrier’s focus, again, would be on the software that can communicate with all of these devices and a limited bit of hardware to translate between different in-home protocols. This could even be rolled into a set top or residential gateway, or easily added on with dongles or Ethernet-to-the-x protocol bridges.

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