Google, Honeywell agree to resolve Nest Labs patent dispute

Alphabet’s Google and climate control systems maker Honeywell International have reached an agreement to resolve patents disputes related to Alphabet’s Nest Labs, a maker of Internet-connected thermostats. The companies said on Thursday that they had reached a long-term patent cross-license agreement. The statement did not disclose financial and other details of the agreement. Google had acquired Nest Labs , the makers of the Nest Learning Thermostat and the Protect smoke detector for a whooping $3.2 billion. (Also read: CEO Tony Fadell meets Google to defend Nest: Report ) Nest Labs was one of Google’s biggest acquisition this year. It was founded by Tony Fadell, a former Apple employee who is popularly known as the “Father of the iPod”. The company said that nearly 5000 developers had shown interest in creating apps for Google. last year, a Cisco report revealed how the number of devices connected to Internet of Things (IoT) will increase from 15 billion today to 50 billion in 2020. Another report by  **Juniper Research** claimed the figures could go as high as 38 billion by 2020. We aren’t sure if these predictive numbers could possibly be true, but it is certain that IoT is big and here to stay. With inputs from Reuters