While Home Depot’s sell date may be 9/1, wireless Wink LED bulbs have started popping up on store shelves. And, along with them, is some very interesting box art… including the yet-to-be announced Wink Relay Controller. By way of Amazon and a Google cache, we learn the incoming device features:
So not only does this product seek to bring wall-mountable touchpads to the masses, versus the custom integration crowd and should the $250 price point stick, but it may also serve as the Wink hub itself … and reside in an existing electrical box (which slightly ratchets up the complexity). Of course, the benefit to a solution like this is you wouldn’t always have to physically possess a preconfigured smartphone to interact with your home. And, the touchscreen mated to a pair of programmable mechanical buttons seems quite versatile. We may not be quite ready to recommend the GE Quirky home automation collaboration, but they clearly have a broad vision with all kinds of goodies in the pipeline.