Thinka Z-Wave
Thinka was founded in 2015 by Michael Franken (CEO) and is based in Amsterdam. According to the company, 90% of all HomeKit accessories are based on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, while they are not optimized for smart home connections. Z-Wave is more suitable for this, because of the large range and the fact that it is energy-efficient, so that batteries in sensors last up to ten years. In addition, it suffers less from interference than Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. The problem is that many Z-Wave accessories are not HomeKit-enabled.
Maybe you once bought smart accessories with Z-Wave and later regretted it when you decided to switch to HomeKit? Z-Wave is one of the many protocols for smart home products and is used by Fibaro, for example. You should therefore always pay attention to whether you have the right variant. According to Thinka, there are more than 3,300 smart Z-Wave products that you can make suitable for HomeKit with this new controller. It also works with Amazon and Google Home.
We are testing this accessory and you will read more about it shortly!
With the purchase of Thinka Z-Wave you can choose from accessories from 600 brands, including switches, dimmers, thermostats, doorbells, sprinklers, speakers, fans, curtains and sensors. Extra handy is that you can control it from Apple's Home app and that the controller has a built-in computer that stores your data locally. Thinka therefore does not use the cloud.
Thinka Z-Wave will be available from September 7 through Thinka's own webshop and robbshop. Later, Amac, Momotica and Coolblue will also be added with a further rollout on September 15. The suggested retail price is €429. This makes the price slightly above that of the Homey Pro (€400) with which you can also connect all kinds of non-compatible accessories.
