Amazon.com Inc has agreed to buy video doorbell maker Ring, the companies said on Tuesday, in what analysts see as a growing bet on delivering packages inside of shoppers’ homes and on home security.
The deal valued Ring at more than US$1 billion, a source familiar with the matter said.
Amazon declined to discuss the terms.
Ring is set to be one of Amazon’s most expensive takeovers after its US$13.7 billion deal last year for Whole Foods Market.
Amazon, the world’s largest online retailer believes that selling Internet-connected gadgets from Kindle e-readers to its new Cloud Cam will spark more shopping on Amazon.com.
Ring offers the company a popular consumer electronics brand that it might not have replicated internally.
SECURITY DEVICES
More importantly, Ring’s security devices could work well with Amazon Key, a smart lock and camera system that lets delivery personnel put packages inside a home to avoid theft or, in the case of fresh food, spoiling.
“As Amazon moves more aggressively into the grocery delivery space ... we believe smart security devices will be an important factor in driving user adoption,” Baird Equity Research analyst Colin Sebastian said in a note.
Amazon’s Alexa Fund, which offers venture capital to companies working on voice technology, invested in the Santa Monica, California-based Ring.
Ring devices can integrate with Amazon’s voice-controlled assistant Alexa.
Users of Amazon’s Echo Show device can say: “Alexa, show my front door” to receive a live feed of activity around their home via Ring cameras.
The deal creates potential for much more, analysts said.
“Amazon more than Ring can revolutionize home security,” Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said.
BIG LOSER
US security and alarm company ADT could be the biggest loser, he added.
Ring’s “camera technology is far superior to physical security... With Amazon having roughly 100 million Prime members, that’s a big addressable market for them to start selling this into.”
Shares of ADT Inc fell more than 2 percent after the news to close at US$11.60.
Amazon shares closed down 0.7 percent.
Amazon was working on a competing smart lock with camera prior to the deal, a separate person familiar with the matter said.
Its decision to buy Ring underscores the task start-ups have trying to win in the home security space.
“For consumer businesses, it’s going to be challenging to compete with folks like Google and Amazon,” said Luke Schoenfelder, chief executive of Latch, which sells smart lock systems to apartment building owners.
Amazon also acquired the maker of Blink home security cameras for about US$90 million late last year.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”