Amazon has officially closed the deal to acquire Ring. And as a result, the price of Ring’s first-generation smart doorbell is slashed from US$180 to US$100.
The deal was reportedly US$1 billion, marking one of the biggest acquisitions for Amazon. Ring’s product price was reduced in order to let more consumers adopt smart home services, said Dave Limp, head of Amazon’s devices and services
In an interview with CNET, Amazon said that it will start to add Ring’s products and services to Amazon’s portfolio, which includes Amazon Key, a delivery service that allows others to enter the house and lets homeowners monitor the event via smartphones. “I wouldn’t want to make any commitments at this point in time (about Amazon Key integration), but it’s certainly one that’s on the list that we’ll start thinking about,” Limp said.
Amazon now controls about 70% of the U.S. smart speaker market with its Echo devices. Its Alexa voice assistant works with thousands of connected devices, including Ring’s products.
In order to compete with other companies in the rising smart home market, Amazon is expanding its portfolio across smart home categories. Starting with a smart speaker, the company now also owns the Fire TV streaming device and Cloud Cam security camera, besides owning smart doorbell maker Ring and camera maker Blink.
In the interview with CNET, Amazon plans to let Ring run independently and let it keep its headquarters in Santa Monica. The two will seek deeper integration in Amazon’s smart home services.
Ring, Blink and Amazon Cloud Cam will continue to operate under their current brand names and keep their existing services to customers.
The two companies started to work together under Amazon’s Alexa Fund.
Other products from Ring, such as the video doorbell 2 and the spotlight camera, aren’t getting discounted. Ring users still continue to pay the same subscription fees for cloud usage.