LG acquires Dutch smart home firm Athom to beef up its AI home business
Image: LG Electronics
LG Electronics said on Wednesday that it has acquired an 80% stake in Dutch smart home platform firm Athom, with the remaining 20% to be bought in the next three years.
The South Korean home appliance maker said it plans to integrate Athom's Homey platform, which links appliances, sensors, and light devices, with its own generative AI-enabled LG ThinQ platform.
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The deal will let LG gain "deeper insights" into customers' lifestyle and usage patterns that will, in turn, enable customers to create a personalized environment tailored to their preferences in their "AI homes," the company said.
Athom's open smart home platform Homey connects with home appliances and IoT devices. Since Athom launched Homey in 2014, Homey has gained hundreds of thousands of users in Europe, LG said. Homey is also available in North America, Singapore, and Australia.
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Athom's flagship service Homey Pro can connect over 50,000 devices, including those from partners Philips Hue and Ikea, over Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Z-Wave, Matter, Thread, and other connection methods, the South Korean home appliance maker said.
The Homey App Store also offers approximately 1,000 apps based on collaboration with other companies and the Homey community that continue to grow the open platform, LG said. This means more third-party devices and services will be integrated into LG's home appliance ecosystem. LG also plans to continue strategic investments into platform-based home appliance solutions, such as its webOS advertisement platform and AI home business.
LG offers a wide variety of hardware for the home, including TVs, washing machines, and refrigerators. Since launching its webOS TV platform in 2021, the company has been keen to capitalize on this wide portfolio by connecting these devices through software in a bid to find revenue streams outside of hardware sales. One of its latest pushes is free ad-supported streaming channels offered on its TVs.
The acquisition of Athom shows that LG is also exploring software-based business models. By having the AI-enabled LG ThinQ platform connect to more devices, LG is trying to see if it can generate revenue by riding the recent AI boom.