Motorola Buys Premise

Premise's partners and customers have long praised the company's overall communications and strong integration assistance and technical support, but many are concerned those will lag during and after the transition. "We haven't heard anything from anyone at Premise since the day they announced it. They've been so busy jumping through hoops for their new company that they don't have time for their customers," says Jeff Bowlby, president of ReVisioneers, a Sammamish, Wash.-based building contractor that is installing the software in a model home before offering it to customers. "They're not calling us back, and we need to get code written for some of these black boxes [which] requires expertise from the folks over there."

In a letter to customers and partners, Dan Quigley, a Premise founder and now the senior director of Premise technology in the Motorola Consumer Solutions division, says Premise will continue to provide some Web-based support and will maintain its online developers' community. It will, however, terminate its dealer-direct program, through which it has supported most of its partners, and will cut back training programs, Quigley wrote. Companies that have been in the dealer-direct program say they have been assured they can still directly call engineers for support, but many fear Premise will cut the support, especially as the software becomes more of a consumer-oriented product.

"Long term, sure, it's a worry if we'll get the support we've always gotten," says Rob Kowalski, president of Chicago-based integrator Automated Lifestyles. "Early on, a year, year and half ago, it was very easy to get in touch with anyone you wanted over there. We were dealing with the principals in the organization, not a low-level customer-service rep. That will obviously change."

Integrators say the cuts in support will have the most effect on new partners, who might not be able to receive the training and assistance they need to learn the intricacies of the platform. Some of Premise's partners also expressed concern that Premise's entrepreneurial creativity may be stifled in the new environment, but are waiting to see what the future holds.

Despite these concerns, Premise's partners are generally positive about the sale and believe Motorola's deep resources and brand recognition will bring much-needed exposure to the product and will drive development.

"Getting a bigger company behind it that has a good stronghold in the industry and that deals in the retail marketplace more will help to push the product to the forefront and help keep it on top," says Joe Cook, vice president of Kenmore, Wash.-based integrator Cutting Edge Design.

Premise's employees also say they look forward to the innovation they expect to come from working with Motorola. "Through becoming a part of Motorola, the Premise team now has access to all of the resources, engineering prowess and worldwide customer support of a global leader—ensuring that we can not only continue to execute on our product road map, but leverage the synergies between our organizations to expand it," Quigley says.

Motorola's purchase of Premise is expected to drive other big-name vendors to enter the home automation space, thereby sparking additional innovation in the Premise product. Partners praise Motorola's wide product line, saying that its RF-controlled products and numerous consumer devices will offer new opportunities for sales. Integrators also say they hope Motorola will increase the number of drivers and devices that the platform supports, which will help it attain success in both the retail and integrator markets.