Samsung Funds IoT Platform for the Smart Home and Beyond

Afero aims to automate core IoT development tasks to help companies quickly generate smart and interconnected products. (Image courtesy of Afero.)

Samsung recently led a group of investors in funding IoT startup Afero for $20.3 million in a Series A financing. Launched in December 2015, Afero aims to be a comprehensive IoT platform that provides a solution for the information silo problem facing consumer and enterprise IoT devices.

How Afero Plans to Break Down IoT Barriers

The Afero platform hopes to allow IoT developers to speed up product manufacturing and deployment through the automation of core development tasks, such as those for cloud and mobile. This is to be achieved through the use of a secure Bluetooth module, scalable cloud services and developer tools to build connected devices and gather analytics.

Afero’s key goals for its platform include:

Powering both consumer smart homes as well as enterprise IoT markets. Together, these core uses are predicted to generate nearly $6 trillion dollars over the next 5 years
Simplifying both the development of new smart products and the upgrading of legacy products
Comprehensive security embedded throughout the platform
Allowing interoperability between all brands of smart devices through Afero’s end-to-end architecture

Samsung Continues Its Push For a Connected World

It’s not surprising that Samsung would choose to invest in an IoT company seeking to expand device interoperability. Its own SmartThings platform is a member of the Z-Wave Alliance, a group of companies promoting inter-brand connectivity.

Furthermore, Samsung recently announced the SAMSUNG ARTIK Cloud, an IoT platform with a similar goal of increasing interoperability between devices and applications. Its new partnership with Afero may see a consolidation of the platforms in the future.

“This investment amplifies our strategy of open innovation and collaboration which fuels innovative startups and enables them to bring their visions to market more effectively,” commented Shankar Chandran, head of the Samsung Catalyst Fund responsible for the investment. Chandran sees the value in partnering with a company that shares Samsung’s goals to collaborate with other organizations to build better, more comprehensive IoT platforms.

“Afero has built an elegant end-to-end platform solution that solves a real problem for companies struggling to set-up, deploy and manage IoT at scale,” he said.

To learn more about how to decide which IoT platform is right for you, check out 10 Questions to Ask an IoT Platform Provider.