Everything will be connected; even things not generally associated with smartphones, like the home thermostat, locks to your house. Event to keep your home plants watered, using a sensor which transmits information on temperature, light and humidity and alerts you when your plants are thirsty.
Smartphones are still connected to the cloud in terms of accessing data and transmitting information, but it seems to me that the smartphone in many ways is becoming the “remote control” of our digital lifestyle.
While making the sensor talking to the smartphones, who talks to the cloud via internet, in this scenario the smartphones are really emerging as the hub of our digital lifestyles.
A good example of this is the role of my smartphone in my car. My smartphone uses bluetooth to connect to my car’s digital display, sound system... which has channels for music, data and voice. When a call comes in to me, the phone serves as the hub that connects to my car’s screen, mic, speakers and tells me who is calling, and even allows me to use the controls on the car's steering wheel to answer the call. And the rest of the time I listen to music via bluetooth on my smartphone connected to Spotify and all this since some years.
And if you are diabetic, one health product that is really interesting is iHealth’s wireless blood glucose meter.
Or an HD version of WiFi camera at home or in your office, a device with 720p video and digital audio capture for monitoring on-the-go and easy setup with your smartphone and all this for $150.
Whirlpool showed at the Las Vegas tech gathering this year its line-up of smart appliances which can send a user a text message when the laundry is done, and more.
I believe we will see over the next two years, thousands of sensor-based products tied to apps on our smartphones. The health-, kitchen-, TV- and car- segment is the beginning of our connected digital lifestyles.
