Nice debuts new smart home products for the US market

The IoT industry has taken hold of homes worldwide and, of course, it isn't only the big names in the market that are playing the game. Manufacturers of connected home products can be found all over the world but not all of them are able to make their mark in the large US market. Italian company Nice is making another stab at making it big with a line of smart home products covering almost everything from smart home hubs to garage door openers.

Nice Yubii is billed as an "ecosystem" that connects lighting, blinds, shutters, and garage door under a single roof, Nice's roof, that is. At the literal and figurative heart of this smart home ecosystem is the Nice Core Hub that connects via Wi-Fi to coordinate communication between various Nice products. This is done through the MyNice App and can be integrated with Google Home and Amazon Alexa.

The Nice Spy probably has the strangest name in the new lineup. It has nothing to do at all with monitoring but is, instead, a traveling motor for garage doors. In addition to offering control via the Nice Era remote, the Spy provides additional safety features like obstacle detection and entrapment avoidance that will stop and reverse movement if an object is detected. You don't even have to give up your existing guard rails as it can be integrated with them.

The Nice Era Inn, yet another odd name, is a cousin of the Nice Spy but instead of garage doors, it automates and manages indoor blinds instead. It offers the same safety features like obstacle detection and operates with low noise and energy efficiency.

If the Nice Era Inn opens and closes window blinds, the Nice Era One LR opens gates and garage doors. Considering the distance it has to work, the bidirectional transmitter uses LoRa or long-range, low power wireless technology. The operating distance is advertised to be 1 km (0.62 miles), more than enough even for the most expansive properties.

Nice's new smart home products admittedly target a rather small subset of homeowners which could actually increase its chances of success in the US. That said, availability details, including price, have not been announced yet but the company does promise these will come this year.