The Z-Wave Alliance, a global membership organization dedicated to advancing the popular Z-Wave wireless smart home protocol, announced its completed incorporation as a solely independent non-profit organization, as well as announcing its seven founding members under its new standards development organization (SDO) structure: Alarm.com, Assa Abloy, Leedarson, Ring, Silicon Labs, StratIS, and Qolsys.
“For over 15 years, the Z-Wave Alliance has stood as a leader in the smart home and IoT industry, with diverse membership comprised of manufacturers, integrators, and others all supporting Z-Wave’s growth in the market,” said Mitchell Klein, executive director of the Z-Wave Alliance in a statement. “Establishing our founding members, several of which have been with us as board members for many years, is a critical step forward in setting a new course for the Alliance to follow in 2020 and beyond. By making these changes to the Z-Wave Alliance’s role and to the Z-Wave Specification, our goal is to facilitate open IoT deployment and engage new kinds of companies into Z-Wave development to bolster the ecosystem, including silicon vendors and software developers, to bring Z-Wave to more devices and more industries.”
Under the SDO, Z-Wave Alliance members will be given new opportunities to participate in the organization, with new membership levels and structure, as well as workgroups and committees. These include technical working groups specific to features such as the physical layer working group (mac/PHY), networking layer working group to support the new Z-Wave Specification, application layer working group (command class specification), as well as working groups for certification, security, and marketing. Committees will be established to manage operational, as well as technical and marketing needs.
This new membership and organizational structure will be member-driven to support forward momentum, project development, technology development and changes, and other pieces critical to the growth of Z-Wave in the market.
“Alarm.com has used Z-Wave for more than a decade to help expand our platform so that millions of people can control and manage an ever-growing range of devices that work together to protect and automate their home or business,” Alarm.com Chief Product Officer Dan Kerzner said in a statement. “Along with the other founding members, we remain committed to shaping this evolving and impactful technology.”
“We’re excited about the future of Z-Wave and the new direction the organization is taking,” said Mike Harris, president of Ring Solutions. “Shifting to an independent group will allow us to have direct access to moulding the future of Z-Wave, along with other industry leaders, to continue to bring simple, secure smart home solutions to everyone.”
The Z-Wave Alliance is currently in the process of transferring memberships and establishing workgroups.
For additional information on new membership levels, FAQs about the SDO, visit https://z-wavealliance.org/sdo/
