Bench Talk

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As technology continues to advance, consumer electronics are becoming capable of unprecedented functionalities that are redefining how we interact with our devices. Specifically, the emergence of virtual assistants, such as Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, or Google’s “Hey Google”, has introduced a completely new human-machine interface to the consumer.

A shortcoming of this technology, however, is that any of their respective virtual assistants can control only devices within these ecosystems. In today’s world of the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart home ubiquity, the true goal is for all IoT devices, regardless of manufacturer, to be controlled through a single voice assistant.

Now, for the first time ever, this goal is possible through the use of Matter. In this blog, we’ll discuss the new human-machine interface, the rise of Matter, and how Matter powers the spread of virtual assistants.

The rise of virtual assistants marks the greatest paradigm shift in human-machine interaction since the invention of the touch screen.

Owing to modern advances in machine learning and natural language processing, many consumer devices are now capable of understanding and acting on human language. This technology has grown so popular that the majority of the world’s largest technology companies, including Apple, Google, and Amazon, now integrate virtual assistants into almost all of their product offerings.

With this new human-machine interface, consumers are able to command their devices simply through spoken word, leading to faster, easier, and more intuitive device interactions. Even more importantly, this technology is not limited to one-way communication but rather is bidirectional. Users can communicate with their devices through spoken word, and devices can communicate with users through audio or other forms of notification. For example, a virtual assistant in a smart security system like Ring may alert a user to motion outside the front door.

Virtual assistants are incredible and important, but the industry still falls short in the breadth of devices that can leverage the technology. Today, most major consumer electronics companies offer their own unique virtual assistant, which is largely only capable of interacting with other devices within its manufacturer ecosystem. For example, an Amazon Alexa may only be able to control connected light bulbs that were designed explicitly to work with Alexa.

This scheme is far from ideal as it limits the breadth of a virtual assistant’s purview, ultimately minimizing the technology’s impact and the consumer’s ability for market choice. Instead, in the ideal scenario, all smart devices, regardless of manufacturer, would be interoperable and controlled by a single, nonspecific virtual assistant.

To address these shortcomings, many prominent organizations in the IoT industry collaborated to develop Matter. Sponsored by the Connectivity Standards Alliance, Matter is a communication standard that defines a means for all IoT devices to become interoperable. Designed specifically for smart home devices, Matter is a manufacturer-agnostic technology that describes a standard communication protocol for connected devices.

With Matter, smart home devices from disparate manufacturers can communicate and share data with one another without being designed explicitly for use with one another. In this way, Matter enables a vast IoT ecosystem where consumers and designers can rest assured that their devices will work reliably together and with a high degree of security.

Among the many exciting applications that Matter enables, its support of the new human-machine interface is one of the most important. In the context of virtual assistants, the rise of Matter means that, for the first time ever, devices from different manufacturers can be controlled by a single point. For example, in a Matter-enabled, smart-home ecosystem, a user can control the lights; heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning system; and other connected devices through a voice command given to a single virtual assistant, such as Alexa or Siri, or both.

Importantly, with this technology, consumers are able to exercise more control over their IoT ecosystems than was previously possible. Furthermore, Matter truly democratizes the smart home space, giving users more choices about which manufacturers and devices to purchase and incorporate into their home ecosystem. Whereas users previously may have been limited to devices within a single vendor’s ecosystem, Matter allows them to choose whichever device they desire, as long as that device is Matter-compliant.

Matter also enables users to gain deeper insights into and understanding of their homes with greater ease than before. Previously the market was fragmented, requiring users to download numerous apps to access the unique dashboard associated with each of their smart devices. With Matter, all of the user’s device information can be consolidated into a single platform, providing a single place to view all relevant and important smart home data.

The emergence of virtual assistants has given rise to a completely new and improved form of human-machine interaction. Yet, before virtual assistants can truly impact the industry to their fullest potential, we need a way to address industry fragmentation and allow any one virtual assistant to control any number of devices, regardless of manufacturer.

Matter is the solution to these challenges, presenting a way for disparate devices to become interoperable and empowering a single virtual assistant to control an entire ecosystem of these disparate devices. The combination of virtual assistants and Matter will enable a future in which users have more control over and insight into their smart homes.