Ikea and Sonos Partnership Blending "Music and Sound"
Completing their third phase, Ikea has announced a partnership with Sonos to compliment their wireless charging and smart lighting initiatives. Over the past three years, Ikea has set sights on driving a smart home division right now; the Sonos deal will probably materialize closer to 2019.
“At IKEA we strive to make solutions for life at home by integrating technology into our home furnishing offer that are easy to use and affordable, thereby making smart home technology accessible to the many people,” said Björn Block of IKEA's smart home division. “Together with Sonos we want to democratize music and sound in the home, and we want to create products designed for how people listen together at home. By teaming up with Sonos, we want to combine IKEA home furnishing knowledge with Sonos’ expertise within great home sound.”
The details are scant but let's make a few assumptions. It's undoubtedly a great gateway to more professional installation, and anything notable brands can do to drum up smart home education can probably be taken as a positive. Sonos has also made some pretty significant strides, adding a smart speaker to their line up that will play every digital assistant by next year. They may be a little late to the whole home audio scene, but their showing is a strong one.
"At Sonos we understand the transformational power of music in the home," says Patrick Spence, CEO at Sonos. "We believe that sound should be a considered element of home design, and together we will work with IKEA to create products and experiences that make people's home look and sound more amazing."
More exciting, might be getting the build quality of Sonos speakers in the functionality of Ikea furniture. Delivering sound in creative and beautiful furniture should act less as a DIY nightmare and more of a stepping stone to more advanced solutions from integrators. This, of course, goes hand in hand with Ikea's desire to stay brand agnostic, as they bring in digital assistants to their portfolio, adding Amazon Alexa, confirming Google Assistant, and courting Apple.
