The survey, Global Digital Living, by Parks Associates says 52 percent of U.S. networked households are using Wi-Fi while 50 percent are using Ethernet. The plus-100 percent overlap results from households that use both mediums in their home networks.
The Parks study, which surveyed households in North America and Europe, also found that Canadian households were behind U.S. homes in switching to wireless, with 43 percent of network households there using Ethernet compared to 32 percent using wireless.
Parks Director of Research John Barrett says wireless will be key to adding such services as security to home networks.
“Establishing a solid base of wireless home networks is crucial for the adoption of next-generation services,” Barrett says. “Many applications such as home control, home security or even multimedia distribution are impractical with an Ethernet-only network.”
While home automation is currently a slow sell in Australia, it’s clear that more competitive HA prices and a need for installers to replace revenues from low margin alarm systems will drive the market over the 5 years.
