Matter - smart home connectivity standard (formerly Project CHIP)

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Infineon has finally launched its Matter-compatible 802.15.4 chip.

Even Silicon Lab’s next Z-Wave 800 Series PR can’t help but name-drop Matter “futureproofing”, only via their upcoming Unity SDK,

“Additionally, the introduction of our Unify SDK Z-Wave protocol controller will make it easier for developers to futureproof their smart home product designs for multiple protocols, including Matter. Ultimately, the Z-Wave 800 family will help consumers better their homes with longer-lasting devices that require less power consumption – all without sacrificing quality.”

As an aside, not sure low-margin IoT devices will have much luck through the ongoing silicon shortage. Inovelli’s CEO mentioned they’re having enough trouble sourcing 500 series chips; can’t imagine many devices will have access to these latest-generation SoCs next year.

EDIT: SiLabs claims they’ll show off a Z-Wave to Matter bridge come CES 2022,

Silicon Labs will be showcasing a Z-Wave to Matter bridge solution with Unify SDK at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2022.

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That’s great and all, but I haven’t seen an actual company with a z-wave hub commit to acting as a Matter bridge. It’s a bit worrying since multiple Zigbee hubs have announced their plans (Hue, Aqara). Kinda sucks because I like z-wave…

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I see you here: the Z-Wave Alliance had been optimistic some of the Z-Wave hub manufacturers would implement bridges, but no takers so far?

That leaves us to edge devices, the cloud, or no bridges at all. So SiLabs, Z-Wave Alliance, and Espressif have noted there are three possible bridge types:

  1. At the gateway
  2. At an edge device (e.g., a thermostat, camera, etc.)
  3. In the cloud

If the SmartThings Hub isn’t doing #1 within the Hub or #3 in the ST cloud, perhaps Samsung expects third parties to produce an external gateway accessory (#1) and / or edge devices with Z-Wave bridges (#2) to percolate in the indefinite future? Or nothing?

For #2, Z-Wave devices use the edge device as the hub, so if ST wants to lift a finger for us here, they’d make that transition easier or if not, a lot of excluding & including are still expected.

Shu Chen, Espressif Senior Engineering Manager: “A Bridge may also contain native Matter functionality, for example, it may itself be a smart Thermostat having both Wi-Fi and Zigbee connection. The Thermostat is native Matter functionality, it is capable of sending heating and/or cooling requirement notifications to a heating/cooling unit. While the other endpoints represent the Bridged Devices.”

Mitch Klein, executive director, Z-Wave Alliance and director of strategic partnerships at Silicon Labs: “Matter requires a border router or bridge to connect a Thread device to a Wi-Fi device, and we will similarly see bridges into Z-Wave on Matter. How this bridging will be deployed will depend on the manufacturers. Bridging may be deployed on a gateway, an edge device, or in the cloud. All options will be available as the various working groups establish the necessary APIs and requisite roadmaps for the future.”

Silicon Labs Matter Connectivity Standard FAQ:

How is Z-Wave going to fit into Matter? Z-Wave (and Zigbee) networks have IP at the gateway level enabling cloud connectivity to Matter. Further we will see bridging products, enabling Matter and Z-Wave products working together at local network level.

The ThinkA zwave to HomeKit hub provides a clear model for how a zwave hub might become a matter bridge. In fact, I would expect them to be one of the first manufacturers to add Matter compliance, but we will see.

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It’s not quite as easy as it sounds, though, because to get into matter you have to have IP addresses. Zwave does have a “Z wave over IP“ specification, but as far as I know, no current “available at retail” hubs use it.

https://www.silabs.com/documents/public/white-papers/ZIP-and-IoT-Whitepaper.pdf

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That’s a great new hub; I wish it was priced more competitively and had the US Z-Wave frequencies. Yet Aeotec doesn’t seem too eager to update the 500-series ST V3 hubs.

I believe Espressif’s blog post shares that Z-Wave devices see the Z-Wave/Matter Bridge only as a Z-Wave Hub (primary or secondary?). That is, the hard work seems to be on the bridge to convert MatterIP-to-Z-Wave and Z-Wave-to-MatterIP.

And then the bridge device “exposes” the Z-Wave devices to the Matter Fabric, which can then be controlled by Matter Controllers.

Meanwhile, people may have a question: There are many IoT products in the consumers’ home already, these can be the devices based on Zigbee, Z-Wave, BLE Mesh and others. Could these non-Matter devices work together with Matter ecosystem? The answer is YES.

Thus, hopefully, we may not need Z-Wave over IP on the device-side. But, we’ll see: if SmartThings (and / or Aeotec) decides it isn’t interested in Z-Wave bridging, I do hope manufactures like ThinkA or others will come forward with full-featured hubs (Matter hubs + multiple bridges).

At this point, I’d much rather replace a SmartThings hub than replace all the switches, lights, accessories, etc.

// in other news

Google Developers has also launched a short set of videos for Android app Matter Controllers this week. This video seems like multi-admin is likely confirmed for the standard (e.g., multiple apps / controllers attached to a single device).

Noting how different some UIs are, I hope they’ll allow proper syncing, so we don’t need to repeatedly & manually propagate each device across, say, three controllers (Alexa, HomeKit, Google Home, etc.).

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SmartThings recently released the Matter round table from SDC 2021. From Mark Tekippe, Director of Product Management:

Question: Mark Tekippe, from a SmartThings perspective, can you talk a little more about how SmartThings is supporting these IoT protocols?

Mark Tekippe: You know, I think the points that both Michelle (CSA) and Kevin (ASSA ABLOY) raised are spot-on. At SmartThings, we’ve always been an open platform with support for different protocols. We’re really excited about Matter and emerging technologies like Thread. And we are working to add support for both of these in our platform. At the same time, we’re committed to continuing support for existing protocols like Zigbee and Z-Wave. Our developer community has really made significant investment around both of these technologies over the years. And many of our users have huge installs in their homes with dozens or even hundreds of devices in their house. So, things like door locks, light switches, garage door openers: these are really difficult and expensive to replace. And when people buy these products, they expect them to last a long time: 10, 15, 20 years. In my own house, I installed dozens of connected light switches after I moved in and the thought of me going around and replacing all of those and rewiring them is really hard to fathom. So, you know I think the point of bridging which was raised earlier: bridging is going to be really important between existing and new protocols. And that’s going to help the industry transition smoothly forward and also protect consumer investments.

Emphasis mine. So, bridging is “really important”, but seemingly SmartThings won’t be adding / selling a Z-Wave bridge? If that’s true, seems like everyone was relying on someone else to “build the bridges”, unfortunately. Re:

https://twitter.com/SmartThingsBeat/status/1456653578450481153?s=20

“Bridge” has a technical meaning in the Matter protocol, but I don’t think that’s what Mr. Tekippe meant.

If we just look at it as a regular English word, then in a sense you could consider the smartthings app to be the method for bringing matter devices and Zwave devices together: but only for people using that specific app.

So far, Samsung has only committed to one way integration with matter: being able to bring Matter compliant devices into the smart things app and smartthings automations. Which is helpful, and would fit what he had described in that talk.

What they have said they are NOT going to do is currently commit to two way integration, that is, a smartthings/Aeotec hub will NOT be a “Matter bridge,” so it will not show up in other mattercompliant apps.

So you’re absolutely right that they have not committed to being a Zwave to Matter bridge. But within the smartthings ecosystem, it looks like you will be able to use the smartthings app to create a routine that includes both Zwave Devices and Matter compliant devices. At least the models that work with smartthings.

In a sense, it’s similar to what homebridge does now for HomeKit. You can use homebridge to bring devices of other protocols into HomeKit. But it doesn’t provide integration in the other direction.

So that’s something. Even if it’s not a full two way bridge.

But we will have to see what actually gets delivered. :thinking:

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Promises?

Just kidding…

We all know that at the end platforms like SmartThings will kill the new protocol by deception and misleading advertisements and by the minimalist integrations.

This is the first I’ve seen a SmartThings staff mention working on Thread integration (other than via a Thread border router via Matter, like Nanoleaf). Considering Mark is on the Board of Directors for both CSA and Thread, I suppose he would know. Would be kinda embarrassing to be on the BoD of Thread and work for a company that doesn’t directly support it :sweat_smile:

I also don’t know what to make of SmartThings press releases/relations lately for predicting what’s coming. I was pissy after SDC that their upcoming hub embedded in TVs and fridges didn’t include any IoT radios like zigbee or zwave. Well 2 months later and we now know they will sell a zigbee dongle that works with it. This was obviously in the works 2 months ago, why not mention it at the same time?!

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It sounds familiar. Wasn’t this “dongle” sold with some TVs before and with the Nvidia Shield?

If it is going to be the same story, as those, then that’s going to be a big fail again for many users who would buy it, if it would be available at all.

Otherwise just think about Samsung’s idea how often you should change your TV. They will drop support for the TV in 2 years. How will that work afterward?
And how is that fits into the “we are not producing anymore hub hardware”? Now they will have a “hub” built into a TV and a dongle what has to be manufactured with the same radios what would be in a real hub… (And knowing Samsung, the dongle would work only with those TVs… In contrast with the energy management initiatives and reaching being carbon neutral, it is absolutely the opposite of producing a huge amount of e-waste in a few years time.)

And where is the WASH program nowadays?

Same idea as the shield dongle and a 2nd generation dongle that went through regulatory approvals but never made it to mark. This third generation lacks z-wave, though. Maybe it can be firmware updated to Thread? :man_shrugging:t2:

Why can’t they just make a nice USB compatible Zigbee coordinator what could be used with other devices as well? (The camera what I bought for my Samsung TV is a 1080p camera from 2017, and it works ONLY with that H series of Samsung TVs. Of course, no Skype anymore on the TV to use with it…)

This is the same story over and over again, producing e-waste endlessly, without a chance to re-purpose it.

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Daniel Wroclawski over at Consumer Reports has an excellent Matter FAQ from an end consumer point of view.

With regard to the Arlo announcement, it’s important to note that matter has not yet included any cameras: this is just Arlo saying they want to be part of deciding what any future camera standard might be.

From the CR report:

Which Types of Smart Home Devices Will Work With Matter?
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At launch, Matter will support lighting products (plugs, bulbs, switches, etc.), door locks, thermostats and HVAC controllers, blinds and shades, home security sensors (such as door and window sensors, motion sensors, and smoke and carbon monoxide detectors), garage door controllers, wireless access points and bridges, and televisions and streaming video players.
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Future iterations of Matter are expected to add support for home appliances, robot vacuums, and energy management products (such as solar panels, EV chargers, home battery packs). According to Chris LaPré, the CSA’s head of technology, cameras are likely to be included in a future version, thanks to camera manufacturers like Arlo, Eve, TP-Link, and Wyze joining the CSA, but no formal effort has started yet.”

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Aqara may be the first major hub manufacturer (or the only, as far as I can tell) to officially support Matter bridges, with this video confirming it will expose its Zigbee devices to other Matter controllers:

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Agreed. I should’ve noted Mr. Tekippe’s response was soon after Kevin, the ASSA ABLOY representative, had discussed the official Matter specification for bridging to either Z-Wave or Zigbee.

“While it does, the other technologies–like you said Z-Wave, Zigbee, Thread–they’re not going to go away. They’re not going to be abandoned or left out there on the sidewalk. We’ll continue to support them: if you’re using Z-Wave in the Pro channel now, continue to do so if that feels right for you. And, as Michelle said: that’s the key thing. Matter is not trying to leave them behind: there’s a bridge specification. If you choose, you’ll be able to have those products in the future, through a Matter-to-Zigbee or Z-Wave Bridge, continue to work. So there’s no goal here for Matter to abandon existing ecosystems or leave those types of things behind. So, it’ll take time and while it does, manufacturers such as ASSA ABLOY will be loyal to our customers, we’ll continue to support those technologies, while we evolve Matter, and help you with your future products.”

Though, you wouldn’t need a bridge for Z-Wave / Zigbee products to continue work, e.g., Samsung’s presumed angle currently by enabling two active “devices” in its Hubs: a “legacy” hub and a Matter controller.

You’re right that Samsung hasn’t stated they’ll be adding any bridges. Yet at least one person at SmartThings has noted the importance of bridging (in an official SmartThings panel discussion FWIW), so a bit of either mixed signalling or Samsung themselves don’t know what they’ll do. That is, I don’t put it past Samsung to end up throwing in the towel for bridges permanently, but it’s a slight glimmer of hope they won’t try ST-only lock-in or some convoluted a-SmartThings-bridge-yet-annoyingly-non-Matter.

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Funnily enough, I’d actually initially highlighted that section because “Thread integration” had also perked my ears, but I wasn’t sure what Samsung had initially promised before, either, haha.

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Good technical article about what a Matter bridge will be:

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Maybe Matter is really “Skynet” LOL :rofl:

Seeing how Matter evolves and the plans to build the video/audio streaming into the standard as well, I am curious how this will end up after the sh!tshow what Sonos and Google pulled recently through a court ruling and ongoing lawsuits.

When will a company axe the standard with a patent claim?

Here I mean the group volume control and including devices that should be part of it.

Especially that Sonos is not a Matter participant:

https://buildwithmatter.com/

But they are part of the Connectivity Standard Alliance. (it is hard to find it…)

It depends how you define “major,” but I think Phillips hue was the first. Their bridge will expose Hue brand Zigbee devices connected to it to other matter-compatible apps.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that both Hue and aqara already do exactly the same thing for HomeKit. They are very similar architectures in this regard.

It will be interesting to see what Lutron and Lightwave RF do.

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