Nest developers to join Google's IoT team: Report

It hasn’t been a great year for Google-acquired Nest, known for building connected thermostat and smoke detectors. After being surrounded by controversies including its struggle to generate revenue, a new restructuring is reportedly in place to help Nest and Google together focus on IoT efforts. According to Fortune, Nest Labs, an Alphabet subsidiary, will become a part of Google to create a unified IoT platform. It will now be led by Hiroshi Lockheimer, who is currently the Senior Vice President of Android. “The combined group also will continue to work on Google Home, a smart speaker rival to the Amazon Echo, while simultaneously fending off Amazon challenges elsewhere in the smart home,” the report adds. The Nest software developers will be moving over to Google’s payroll, and reportedly it is expected to improve Nest’s financial situation, provided new nest products are developed. “Nest and Google are likely to pitch this as an obvious synergy, but it also plays into ongoing efforts to pare costs at smaller Alphabet units other than Google,” the report further adds. Nest has about 1000 employees, and only a few dozen employees are said to be moving over to Nest, according to Forbes. “Nest’s platform approach to the nascent IoT market was a key strategic asset for its connected smart home gadgets. It’s unclear how this will change the future direction and priorities for Nest. The hardware and software teams will stay at Nest,” the report points out. Google had acquired smart-home startup Nest Labs for $3.2 billion. In the past few months, Alphabet’s pet project, Nest, has been marred with not-so-great reports accusing the chief, Fadell of being a tyrant. The founder of Dropcam, the company acquired by Nest, Greg Duffy, called the selling of Dropcam  a big mistake  and clearly stated the not-so-friendly conditions created by Fadell. It was Fadell’s blame-game remarks that compelled the ex-Dropcam chief to come out in support of his ex-employees. Fadell reportedly met Google to talk about the bad press around its revenue, work culture and defend Nest . Soon Tony Fadell stepped down as the CEO of Nest.