Sberbank will make the house smart and import-independent
Sberbank announced the creation of a new line of home automation devices under the Sber brand. Gadgets are not tied to foreign services and are paired with the Sberbank domestic cloud platform, which excludes the impact of foreign sanctions on their work.
The new device family includes a Wi-Fi socket with overvoltage protection, a control hub, a scenario button, motion, opening, temperature and humidity sensors. All of the above novelties, in addition to the socket, work according to the open Zigbee protocol, which is also not subject to sanctions, and it can also be found in modern smart home techs from Yandex.
Sberbank novelties are the fruit of engineers work at Salyutdevaysy OOO (Salutdevices LLC). Previously, it was a Sberbank subsidiary, which created various gadgets and was called SberDevices. As CNews reported, the company has been renamed in August 2022, and in January 2023 Sberbank sold Salutdevices. Now it is a bank’s third-party partner in the development of smart devices.
Sberbank entered the home automation device market in February 2021. Its product range includes light bulbs, sockets, LED strips, and other gadgets that can be controlled remotely, for example, by a smartphone.
New product capabilities
The answer to the question about the functions of most of Sberbank's new products is contained in their name - this applies primarily to opening, motion, humidity and temperature sensors. A socket as well allows to control connected devices at a distance, for example, create turn-on and turn-off scenarios with reference to day time. Or you can connect a humidifier, and program it to turn on when the room humidity drops below 30%. The socket is equipped with protection against overheating and overvoltage.
The Sberbank smart hub is designed to combine all smart devices into one network using the top-level Zigbee 3.0 protocol. This protocol is based on the IEEE 802.15.4 wireless communication standard, and has been developed since 2004. At first, Zigbee was positioned as an alternative to Bluetooth, but later it became niche and now it is used mostly in smart home devices. Among its advantages is minimal power consumption: Sberbank told CNews that sensors operating under this protocol can work for several years without changing the battery.
Sber smart devices can be managed through the bank's special web application, which will be actual for iPhone and iPad owners. For those who prefer Android, the bank will allow to control smart home gadgets through Sberbank Online and Salut for Android applications. Users can create and configure scripts, control status, etc.
Cost and availablity
At the time of material publication, not all of the listed Sber’s innovations were available on the Salutdevices website. The Russians were offered to buy a hub, a scenario button, a motion sensor and a door or window opening sensor, as well as a temperature and humidity sensor. The smart socket will be available later - the developers and bank representatives do not name the exact dates.
The most expensive device in the new line is a smart hub costing about 2,500 rubles. Sberbank wants approximately 1,600 rubles for each sensor, as well as for a smart button, but the socket price has not yet been disclosed. For the present time (until September 15, 2023) it is possible to buy a set of a hub and three sensors (but without a smart button) for approximately 4,800 rubles. And if you purchase them separately, then the final price will be about 7, 300 rubles.
15 months to target
The transition to the own import-independent cloud platform for smart devices is a forced step for Sberbank. Since March 2022, it has been under Western sanctions, that is why its mobile applications are regularly removed from the Google Play and Apple App Stores.
Sber smart gadgets could not hide from the restrictions as well. All smart devices previously released by the bank are based on the Chinese Tuya platform, and at the beginning of May 2022, all of them lost connection to the platform at once. It would seem that China did not impose sanctions against Russia, but the fact remains that the Sber’s access to Tuya was closed. The bank had to stop selling gadgets, as they didn’t operate so far.
It is worth noting that Sberbank did not specify which cloud will be used for connecting its smart devices. Probably, this will be the SberCloud platform or simply Cloud.
This is a Sber’s subsidiary (Cloud Technologies LLC), a cloud service founded in Moscow in October 2016 and initially owned by Sber through other subsidiaries such as “Digital Technologies” and “Digital Assets” legal entities (data from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities).
In May 2022, all subsidiaries of Sberbank left the list of SberCloud founders (data from Kontur.focus), and just a month later, the prefix Sber disappeared from the name of SberCloud. After that, the company promptly rebranded and changed the logo.
https://www.cnews.ru/news/top/2023-08-15_sozdan_polnostyu_suverennyj
