IKEA is delving deeper into the smart home through new partnerships with Amazon, Google, and Apple to enable users to control its TRÅDFRI smart lights by voice command. That functionality will arrive through the partners’ Alexa, Google Assistant, and HomeKit smart home platforms, respectively.

Currently, the lights can be controlled via a smartphone app or custom remote control. Voice command functionality, then, should enable a considerably more convenient user experience – one perhaps more in line with what customers expect from smart home products.

In a statement announcing the partnerships, IKEA suggested that this is merely the beginning of a much more extensive exploration of smart home solutions, asserting that “IKEA sees a great potential in the smart home business,” and that “additional launches” are in the pipeline. As for the new partnerships, they reflect the company’s belief that “[m]aking our products work with others on the market takes us one step closer to meet people’s needs, making it easier to interact with your smart home products,” commented IKEA Home Smart Business Leader Björn Block.

IKEA says the new voice command functionality will roll out this summer and in early autumn.

Sources: The Verge, Business Insider