Recent reports predict that the home automation industry will be worth more than $45 billion by 2016, which is not surprising if you saw the items from Iris, Wink, Nest and Lyric that were front-and-center in stores and commercials this past holiday shopping season. But since these connected devices depend on residential Wi-Fi/broadband, service providers are typically first in line to be blamed if something goes wrong for their subscribers – even if it’s an unrelated equipment issue, app problem or simple user error.

While the traffic impact of these devices isn’t drastic, they do add increasing complexity to home networks as well as introduce a whole new level of importance to subscribers (e.g., heat in winter, locking doors, security cameras, etc.). As a result, many operators are faced with one of two options: they can either let subscribers go the DIY approach with the devices listed above, or take control with their own smart home services (as in the case of Comcast’s Xfinity Home solution). But in both cases, without the ability to see inside the home gateway, there is a limit to how much troubleshooting these service providers are actually able to do… potentially opening the door to customer dissatisfaction and churn.

Stephane Bourque, founder and CEO of Incognito Software Systems, has provisioned 110 million subscriber devices worldwide and is here to provide insight into the ramifications of home automation that consumer electronic manufacturers, service providers and end-users should take note of.