Consumers want to be able to control various gadgets and appliances using a single device - and they want that single device to have the features to meet both their business and social needs.
This is the word from Michelle Potgieter, director of corporate marketing and communications for Samsung SA, who spoke to ITWeb on the sidelines of the company's Samsung Forum for Africa event, in Malaga, Spain, last week. "We want everything to be integrated. We want to create an ecosystem where all technologies and appliances speak to one another and are connected."
At the recent Consumer Electronics Show, in Las Vegas, Samsung unveiled its Smart Home, a service enabling smart TVs, home appliances and smartphones to be connected and managed through a single integrated platform, she said.
This kind of data-heavy platform is not for everyone, she added, noting it is targeted at homes where there is a "strong data pipe" into the home, which are not so prominent in SA because of the high cost and unreliability of connectivity in this county.
A big part of this connected experience is about enabling the seamless sharing of content between devices, Potgieter said. Several of the new product offerings on display at the event highlighted this kind of integration, largely enabled by Bluetooth, WiFi and NFC connectivity.
For example, Samsung's newest camera offerings unveiled at the event - the NX30 camera and the Galaxy Camera 2 - allow users to share and transfer content from one device to another.
Using the Tap & Go, MobileLink and AutoShare features, one can transfer content from the NX30 or Galaxy Camera 2 to near-field communication-enabled smartphones and tablets. In addition, users can upload images directly to Dropbox, which comes preloaded on the NX30, in selected regions. Users can also upload content directly to Flickr, in a selected region.
"This ecosystem sees all devices and appliances speaking to one another," Potgieter concluded. "We have over 270 000 employees in 79 countries. We have 33 design centres around the globe. All they do is investigate what the consumer wants and what we have seen is that consumers from all over the world want their devices to be able to speak to each other, allowing them to do everything they need and manage an entire household with ease."
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