Around a year ago Essential, the company founded by Android creator Andy Rubin, revealed an Amazon Echo-style smart speaker dubbed the "Home." However, if Bloomberg is correct, the device might never make it to market.

According to Bloomberg, Essential is in trouble-- so much so it is "considering selling itself," with Credit Suisse helping with the sale. Such a deal would cover the entire company, including its patent portfolio and hardware products such as the Essential smartphone and the aforementioned Home speaker. Also "likely" to be part of the deal is the Essential stable of engineering talent, whose members include ex-Apple and Google hires.

So far Rubin has replied to the Bloomberg story via Twitter, posting “We always have multiple products in development at the same time and we embrace canceling some in favor of the ones we think will be bigger hits. We are putting all of our efforts towards our future, game-changing products, which include mobile and home products.”

Vodafone officially launches V-Home in Spain-- a smart home service powered by the Samsung SmartThings platform promising to allow  “customers to know what happens in their homes at any time and place.”

First presented back at Mobile World Congress 2018, the V-Home service is part of a selection of "all-in-one" fibre, mobile and TV packages. The result of an "exclusive" partnership with Samsung, it is based around the SmartThings hub. All devices are controllable via smartphone, with a companion app allowing one to remotely monitor the home.

In a bid to direct homeowners, architects and designer to smart home solutions Control4 launches #C4Yourself, a global initiative held in in 25 markets around the world.

Held on 31 May 2018 in partnership with Control4 dealers, the imitative sees the company open new experiential dealer showrooms in the UK, US, Canada, China and Australia. Customers in cities around the world can find a Certified Showroom location using the online Control4 Dealer Locator, before registering to attend a local #C4Yourself Day event.

Crestron adds support for 3rd party AV devices to the Pyng home automation platform-- with LG 2017 and 2018 series consumer OLED, Super UHD and UHD TVs being the first getting IP control via the Crestron system.

Pyng offers simple luxury home automation setup and control for a variety of components, including audio, lighting, shades, thermostats, door locks, security keypads, occupancy sensors and photosensors. It allows installers to develop scenes for each room in the home and schedule events via iPad, and in turn homeowners can easily change scenes, settings and system schedules.

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Disney Research have a means to transform walls into a smart home control interface-- and all it requires is conductive paint and some electronics.

"Walls are usually the largest surface area in a room, yet we don't make much use of them other than to separate spaces, and perhaps hold up pictures and shelves," the researchers say. "As the internet of things and ubiquitous computing become reality, it is tempting to think that walls can become active parts of our living and work environments.

Dubbed Wall++, the system involves the application of conductive paint and a sensor board to a wall. The paint is water-based and contains nickel for conductivity. First, one creates a crosshatch pattern on the wall using painter's tape. After the application of two coats of conductive paint with a roller, the tape is removed and the sensor board is connected. Finally the wall is painted again with a top coat of standard latex paint to hide the conductive paint pattern.

According to IDC 2017 global smart home device shipments total 433.1 million-- a 27.6% increase over 2016, a result set to increase to 939.7m device by 2022 with a CAGR of 18.5% over the forecast period.

The fastest growing category within the smart home market remains smart speakers such as the Amazon Echo and Google Home, while all categories except video entertainment products should see a double-digit CAGR over the same period. The market is also seeing some "significant" changes, as both vendors and customers are less interested in central hub devices and more in a common interface tying myriad smart devices together.

"While it's still early days for the smart home market-- and the wider consumer IoT ecosystem in general-- we expect to see considerable growth over the next few years, especially as consumers become more aware of and increasingly interact with smart assistant platforms like Amazon's Alexa and Google Assistant," the analyst says. "Whether in the form of a smart speaker or embedded in a thermostat, fridge, TV, or any other device, smart assistants are quickly becoming the cornerstone of consumer IoT by enhancing the accessibility, use, and functionality of connected devices, which will noticeably boost adoption rates in the near future."