Also, no one cares about this but me, but just so you know there is no device called a “hue hub.” So I’m assuming you meant the “Hue bridge.” Again, no one cares about this but me, so feel free to ignore this post.
Warning: super technical network engineering explanation follows. But the short answer is just that it’s a bridge by definition.
The longer answer:
A bridge (or gateway) converts requests in one protocol to that of another. The hue bridge is a Wi-Fi/ZLL Bridge. The bridge does not, however, “establish” the network. That is it does not assign network IDs to other devices that join to it or control which devices join.
Instead, because the hue bridge is a ZLL device, there is no establishing coordinator on its network.
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A ZigBee Light Link network has no ZigBee network coordinator, even a bridge device merely acts as a router {repeater}
So it’s a bridge per the definition of bridge in the ZLL specification.
The end devices don’t need the bridge in order…