Home appliance maker Bosch is showing off its first meter-enabled appliance on the show floor at CES this week. The 100 Series Fresh Door Bottom Mount Refrigerator Launched in November and should be available for purchase in the US this spring.
The fridge retails for $2,500 and has a chip on board that supports it matter. Eelco Lammertink of BSH, which owns Bosch, Siemens, Thermador, and Gaggenau, says a firmware update to the smart home standard will arrive this summer.
The 100 series is the sister product to the meter-capable The Siemens XXL refrigerator I saw at IFA in Berlin last november That built-in model will hit the European market on a similar timeline. Lammertink tells me BSH plans to bring meters to its Bosch, Siemens and Thermador lines, starting with refrigerators this year, another appliance category next year, and three in 2026.
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Photo by Jennifer Pattison Toohey/The Verge
100 series will support Case 1.3Allows you to remotely control the temperature and receive notifications from the refrigerator on your smart home platform of choice. That way, a smart speaker can announce when the door has been left open if you want.
While many smart refrigerators already have these features, with Mater, the connection between the appliance and the ecosystem becomes local – making it faster and more secure. Currently, only Samsung SmartThings and the home assistant Matter have the accessories, but Lammertink tells me that Amazon will support them this year. No word yet on Google Home or Apple Home.
Lammertink says the plan is to bring energy reporting and energy management capabilities to the refrigerator. This will enable it to be part of a meter-enabled whole home energy management system. Sadly, he said he won’t be updating existing appliances on the mat (bad news for my Thermodor range and dishwasher.) “The challenges are huge,” he said. “We can’t risk bricking your fridge.”
