The Ministry of Science and ICT and companies in each field, including Samsung, LG, LH, and Hyundai Engineering & Construction, are taking the lead in building a smart home (intelligent home) ecosystem that applies Matter standards.

The Ministry of Science and ICT announced the 'Intelligent Home (AI@Home) Construction and Expansion Plan' at the Emergency Economic Ministers' Meeting held on the 9th. The main contents are: △Creating an intelligent home ecosystem, △Strengthening the global competitiveness of the intelligent home industry, △Strengthening intelligent home security and expanding the base, etc.

Global big tech companies such as Amazon, Google, China's Huawei, and Xiaomi are leading the smart home market. In Korea, it has been difficult to form a market due to limited use of AI speakers, wall pads, and different standards, but the plan is to actively support the creation of new markets as global smart home standards are unified into Matter.

Matter is an open smart home interconnection standard and an IoT protocol for connectivity and interoperability between smart devices. Around 530 companies, including platforms, home appliances, and device manufacturers, participated in launching the standard, and Matter version 1.1 was released in May.

■ Creating a private-led smart home ecosystem
The Ministry of Science and ICT is promoting the 'Intelligent Home Leading Project (AI@Home)' to implement and verify a Matter standard and generative AI-based intelligent home model to support the creation of a private-sector-led intelligent home collaboration ecosystem.

To this end, we will first support verification of services that can connect and conveniently control various household devices such as home appliances, lighting, ventilation devices, and heating and cooling devices to which Matter is applied by 2024.

Companies in various fields such as IoT devices, AI, and construction are collaborating and taking the lead. LH, Commax, LG Electronics, Clio, and Chorok Soft are demonstrating elderly healthcare services. Hyundai Engineering & Construction, Hyundai HT, Samsung Electronics, and Goqual are developing a home scenario-based service.

Next, global-leading smart home demonstrations will be promoted, including generative AI, home robots to assist with going out, senior care, and energy efficiency.

In addition, a three-level private certification system will be established to promote branding, and the 'Intelligent Home Alliance' with the participation of domestic construction, home appliance, equipment manufacturing, and AI companies will be launched within the year.

While existing authentication systems have limited device compatibility verification, the IP-based open matter standard supports Bluetooth, Thread, and Zigbee, allowing simultaneous interoperability with multiple platforms, simplifying the authentication system.

■ Strengthening domestic global competitiveness…Establishment of Matter authorized testing laboratory
In order to strengthen the global competitiveness of the smart home industry, we will promote export support, foster the aftermarket, and advance wired and wireless home networks.

We will establish a global standard 'International Accredited Testing Laboratory' within the country within the year to eliminate the financial burden on export companies when obtaining international certification. Based on this, we will strengthen exchanges and cooperation with global standards organizations, the EU, and other major countries in the intelligent home industry, and promote joint development and response to international standards.

We will establish an intelligent home technology support center to support technical issues faced by small and medium-sized device manufacturers, and also support overseas expansion by promising small and medium-sized companies, including participation in major overseas exhibitions.

In addition, it supports the creation of a user-centered aftermarket in addition to the premarket where digital functions are built during construction. It is expected that users will be able to place and install smart home devices without knowing how to build them. Data construction and network advancement, which are the foundations of intelligent home services, are being promoted. Large-scale learning data required for the development of new smart home services based on generative AI will be constructed. To this end, Wi-Fi 6E, a wireless network, will be expanded, and Wi-Fi 7 will be introduced starting in 2024. In new buildings, wired networks using optical cables will be fully deployed, and trunk lines are also expected to be converted to 100% optical.

The government plans to expand zero-trust security measures and train security experts to address the security issues that users are most concerned about.

Minister Lee Jong-ho said, “It is an urgent time to create new markets by actively utilizing the global market turning point to discover leading intelligent home models and services that apply global standards and support the fostering of aftermarkets to activate the use of intelligent homes.” He added, “We will listen to opinions from the field and actively provide support so that intelligent homes can become a new revenue stream and make our lives more convenient.”

In Korea, Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics have been supporting smart TVs and smart monitors that support Matter through platforms such as SmartThings and LG ThinQ, respectively. Based on this, it is predicted that the data acquired in each household will further increase as smart home devices expand.