Hyundai vehicles will integrate with your smart home via Samsung SmartThings

Samsung has always been keen to partner with other OEMs to expand the capabilities of its SmartThings smart home platform, adding features like home energy monitoring to its repertoire. Lately, the company signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Hyundai Motor Group to bring smart home functionality to connected cars. 

In their press releases, the two South-Korean companies pledge to work together to develop services that connect the smart home to digital systems in Hyundai and Kia vehicles, and vice versa. Users will be able to start, stop, and adjust air-conditioning of their cars right from the comforts of home. The integration is also expected to cover EVs, so charging status, battery life and driving range can also be tracked in real-time, too.

These Home-to-Car services will be part of an ecosystem run via the SmartThings platform, which will also make fuel-consumption data accessible from within the home. Even gestures and preset routines are in the works: for example, a “good morning” routine may not only open the curtains and turn on smart lights, but can also adjust a connected car to an ideal temperature for use. 

As for the reverse, the proposed Car-to-Home services will involve a SmartThings car integration via “Ready Upgrade”. Ready Upgrade is built by HARMAN, a subsidiary of Samsung Electronics and allows software and hardware upgrades on vehicles. This promises to allow remote access to user thermostat controls, TVs and other smart home gadgets directly from the car dashboard. This technology also allows the car to be part of an integrated energy monitoring system that tracks energy usage and carbon emissions. For EVs, this information can be used to determine optimal charging times.

Samsung and Hyundai are betting on this collaboration to launch the next-generation smart home. In effect, this appears to be Samsung’s attempt at future-proofing the smart home industry, rather than a product halfway through development. Blurring the lines between smart home and smart car is certainly a fascinating idea, but it’s not coming around anytime soon.

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I was fortunate to be exposed to the awesomeness of tech as a child. I delighted in seeking out the nerdiest sci-fi gadgets I could afford to play with. These days I take a professional interest in biotech, especially health-tracking wearables, and futuristic smart home appliances. If you ever come to Unilag’s College of Medicine, you’ll probably find me geeking about some biomedical discovery. That’s if I’m not scrolling YouTube shorts. Or sleeping.