Smart home market set for double-digit growth in the UAE

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The smart home market in the UAE is poised to achieve a robust yearly growth rate of 11.13 per cent, projecting a market volume of $113.8 million by 2028, according to research by Samsung, the global electronics major.

Today, Samsung has 2.3 million registered SmartThings users in the UAE alone. The trends reflect a surge in the demand for smart home technology, propelled by the nation’s emphasis on innovation and luxury living.

“All the lineup that we are launching with home appliances are going to smart products. And our smartphones come with embedded with the Smart Things Energy and the Smart Things app as well as TVs. So we continue to expect more than double digit growth,” Shafi Alam, Head of Direct-to-Consumer Business & Corporate Marketing at Samsung Gulf Electronics, told Khaleej Times at the launch of the Family Hub refrigerator in Dubai on Tuesday night.

Samsung also demonstrated how its innovations enable a sustainable, connected future as the world gathers in Dubai for the COP28 climate conference. At the event, Samsung highlighted how its SmartThings Energy platform facilitates a transformative approach to energy conservation, highlighting its potential to bring positive changes to UAE homes by significantly reducing costs and improving quality of life.

SmartThings Energy is a new tool within the SmartThings app that allows consumers to take control of their energy consumption with monitoring, target-setting, and notifications of their Samsung appliances and HVAC systems. “We are easily looking at a 20-30 per cent savings in electricity bills, which can go up to 70 per cent,” Alam said.

Smart tech is riding high on demand from Gen Z and millennial consumers. “They are the front runners in tech usage — they use it for for entertainment purposes to control multiple devices at the same time. Imagine that you have mobile phone you have a tablet, you have a watch. And you have of course multiple TVs that people have these days. All these can be seamless connected through smartphones. So we have connected all the dots now so that we are hoping that will drive another exponential growth in this market,” Alam said.

With 52 per cent of the Middle East being millennials, this is the sector that wil drive the market. “They are more looking for connectivity, sustainability, and this concept is getting much more important from the millennial side. What we see is the is growth rates in Middle East is much more higher than the global level, definitely that is a potential we hope to use,” Burcin Arabul, Director of Home Appliances Division for Samsung Gulf Electronics, told Khaleej Times.

DooHee Lee, President of Samsung Gulf Electronics, said: “At Samsung, we believe that connected home technology can transform lives and make them more convenient, connected, and sustainable. With the Family Hub refrigerator, we are transforming the kitchen into a shared, connected experience that goes beyond preparing meals into the new epicentre for the smart home. We have also worked with partners to bring even more experiences directly on the appliance, including online shopping, food recipes, home security and more.”