Smart Tangibles News Digest #2603
- Yoel Frischoff
- 13 minutes ago
- 9 min read
January 19, 2026
Global smart tangibles news from around the world - connected hardware, IoT infrastructure, edge intelligence, standards, and the business models behind long-lived products.
Edge AI has moved from slideware to silicon. In the space of a week, multiple chip and platform vendors have announced IoT devices and stacks that bake in Neural Processing Units (NPUs), security, and orchestration tuned for specific verticals like retail and smart infrastructure. At the same time, market analysts and standards watchers are treating intelligent endpoints, Thread, and Matter compatibility as the new normal rather than speculative upside.
Taken together, this week’s items point to a world where “just a connected device” is no longer enough - the baseline is secure, intelligent, and orchestrated hardware that can stand on its own when the cloud is far away or too expensive.
Cross-Cutting Signals
Edge AI is now a default MCU feature, not a niche add on - Infineon’s PSoC Edge family brings AI acceleration, ultra low power, and PSA Level 4 security into a general purpose MCU platform for smart homes, wearables, robotics, and HMIs, signaling that on device intelligence is becoming table stakes for mainstream IoT silicon.
Vertical IoT platforms are packaging hardware, AI, and retail operations together - MediaTek’s new retail focused IoT platform combines compute, connectivity, and computer vision for store analytics and customer experience, showing how smart tangibles are being productized as full domain solutions rather than generic dev boards.
Vendors are treating lifecycle economics as a core selling point - Silicon Labs is explicitly pitching edge AI and Series 3 wireless SoCs in terms of ROI for smart meters, electronic shelf labels, and CGMs, reframing chips as levers for long lived recurring service revenue rather than one time components.
Macro assumptions now bake in edge AI growth - Market forecasts projecting AI at the edge to quintuple by 2032 solidify “intelligent endpoints” as a planning baseline for boards and investors, not just a speculative trend.
This Week at a Glance
A quick scan of the edge AI and interoperability moves that matter for smart tangibles this week.
Infineon’s PSoC Edge MCU family brings AI acceleration, ultra low power, and PSA Level 4 security into a single platform aimed directly at smart home, wearable, and HMI devices.
MediaTek debuts an IoT platform for AI driven smart retail at NRF 2026, aligning compute, connectivity, and computer vision around store operations and analytics.
Silicon Labs leans into “AI at the intelligent edge,” highlighting demand from smart metering, electronic shelf labels, and health wearables on its Series 3 platform.
A fresh market forecast projects AI in edge computing to grow from around 16.5 billion US dollars in 2024 to nearly 84 billion by 2032, reinforcing the long term investment case.
A new Matter 2026 status review highlights real progress in Thread 1.4, battery life, and product range, while also surfacing ongoing ecosystem fragmentation and communication gaps.
News In Detail
1. Infineon’s PSoC Edge turns MCUs into secure edge AI platforms
PSoC Edge wraps AI acceleration, ultra low power, and PSA Level 4 security into a single MCU platform, raising the baseline for what a “simple” connected device can do.
At CES 2026, Infineon showcased PSoC Edge, a 32 bit ARM based MCU line built around edge AI workloads. The platform exposes NPUs, rich I/O, and high performance cores in power envelopes that still fit smart home sensors, wearables, robotics, and human machine interfaces. Crucially, it is pitched as a bridge between low cost microcontrollers and heavier application processors, so product teams do not need to jump stacks just to add intelligence.
Security is a first class part of the story: PSoC Edge targets PSA Level 4, with hardware roots of trust and secure execution environments. For many devices, that level of security was historically reserved for high end SoCs and gateways. Combined with Infineon’s DEEPCRAFT Studio tooling for building and deploying models, the pitch is that developers can go from concept to secure, AI capable device without constructing their own toolchain.
For OEMs building smart tangibles, this compresses several roadmap decisions. If off-the-shelf MCUs arrive with enough compute and security to host on device models and hardened firmware, it becomes easier to standardize on a single silicon platform across multiple SKUs. It also changes where you draw the line between on device and cloud workloads, because you can keep more intelligence at the edge while still hitting tight power and BOM constraints.
Signals to Watch
Early design wins for PSoC Edge in mid range products like smart thermostats, white goods, and wearables that previously used simpler MCUs.
Availability of reference designs and partner modules that wrap PSoC Edge, radios, and sensors into near finished subsystems.
How Infineon prices security features and AI tooling - as bundled capabilities or separate upsell tiers that influence BOM tradeoffs.
Support for over the air model updates and secure boot configurations in production toolchains.
Key Links
Infineon PSoC Announcement: https://www.infineon.com/market-news/2025/infcss202503-075
Infineon PSoC Edge product page with feature list and security levels. https://www.infineon.com/promo/next-generation-mcu
EE-Times interview: CES 2026: Unpacking Infineon’s PSOC Edge for Secure, High-Performance IoT Innovations: https://www.eetimes.com/ces-2026-unpacking-infineons-psoc-edge-for-secure-high-performance-iot-innovations/
2. MediaTek’s smart retail IoT platform makes stores into edge AI deployments
MediaTek is turning retail locations into standardized edge AI sites, bundling compute, connectivity, and vision into a single IoT platform for high street retail.
At NRF 2026, MediaTek introduced an IoT platform tuned for AI driven smart retail. The offering pairs SoCs, connectivity, and reference designs with computer vision and analytics stacks targeted at tasks like people counting, shelf monitoring, checkout optimization, and in-store personalization. Rather than selling chips alone, MediaTek is presenting a vertically focused platform that retailers and OEMs can integrate into cameras, gateways, digital signage, and point of sale systems.
This marks another step away from “generic IoT” toward domain specific stacks. If store devices can assume a common AI and connectivity baseline, product teams can focus on differentiated experiences and service layers - for example, integrating planogram compliance or dynamic pricing with existing retail systems. It also changes the economics of deploying intelligent hardware fleet wide, because analytics workloads can be distributed across in store devices instead of pushed entirely to the cloud.
From an ecosystem perspective, this tightens the relationship between chip vendors, system integrators, and software partners. Whoever controls the retail IoT platform also influences which device form factors, protocols, and data models become “standard” inside stores, which in turn affects where margins accrue along the value chain.
Signals to Watch
Named retail chains or OEMs adopting MediaTek’s smart retail platform across multiple locations.
Bundled solutions where cameras, ESLs, and gateways ship as a package, rather than as separate procurements.
How much of the analytics stack runs locally versus in the cloud, and whether that split changes as hardware improves.
Openness of APIs and data schemas for third party applications and integrations.
Key Links
NRF 2026 coverage of MediaTek’s AI driven smart retail IoT platform. https://embeddedcomputing.com/technology/iot/edge-computing/nrf-2026-mediatek-unveils-performance-optimized-iot-platform-for-ai-driven-smart-retail
Related Avalue industrial edge AI platforms for smart city and manufacturing, showing similar vertical patterns in other domains. https://www.avalue.com/en/news/list/AIandEdgeComputingAccelerateIoTEvolution
3. Silicon Labs leans into AI at the intelligent edge
Silicon Labs is positioning its wireless SoCs as the backbone for AI enabled meters, labels, and wearables, framing edge intelligence as a lever for recurring service value.
In a recent interview around CES 2026, Silicon Labs’ CEO described growing demand for edge AI across smart meters, electronic shelf labels, and continuous glucose monitors. The company’s Series 3 platform integrates wireless connectivity with hardware acceleration for AI and machine learning, promising better performance and margins compared to previous generations. Analysts are increasingly bullish, pointing to health, metering, and asset tracking as growth drivers that benefit from on device intelligence and low power radios.
Interestingly, Silicon Labs highlights rapid ROI from features like dynamic tariffing in smart meters or adaptive content in shelf labels, enabled by local inference and secure connectivity. That narrative aligns with a broader shift in smart tangibles: hardware is justified not by novelty, but by measurable lifetime value and operational savings.
The combination of edge AI and low power wireless also tightens the link between component choices and service economics. Selecting a platform like Series 3 is implicitly a bet on multi year firmware evolution, security updates, and device management capabilities. Teams that treat the chip as a short term procurement rather than a long lived platform risk underestimating the lifecycle commitments they are making.
Signals to Watch
Shipment volumes and design wins for Series 3 in regulated or long life deployments like utilities and healthcare.
Partnerships between Silicon Labs and cloud or device management vendors that bundle secure fleet operations on top of the silicon.
How customers describe ROI - for example, reduced truck rolls, better billing accuracy, or new subscription features enabled by local intelligence.
Any moves to expose higher level SDKs that abstract RF and AI complexity for application developers.
Key Links
Coverage of Silicon Labs’ edge AI strategy and Series 3 platform economics. https://www.investors.com/news/technology/silicon-labs-slab-stock-ai-moving-to-edge/
Related commentary on edge AI’s impact on device ROI in electronics industry press.
4. Edge AI market forecasts solidify the long term thesis
AI at the edge is no longer a speculative trend - multi year forecasts now assume it will be a core part of digital infrastructure.
A new market report estimates that AI in edge computing grew to about 16.5 billion US dollars in 2024 and could reach roughly 83.9 billion by 2032, implying a compound annual growth rate of around 22.5 percent. North America is projected to hold a leading share, with hyperscalers and chip vendors such as NVIDIA, AWS, Microsoft, Intel, IBM, Cisco, and others named as key players.
While forecasts should always be treated with caution, their assumptions matter for strategy. If investors, partners, and boards internalize edge AI growth as a base case, product teams can expect more pressure to show how new hardware contributes to that trajectory. That might mean demonstrating that a device can host local models, expose usable data to analytics stacks, or integrate cleanly with orchestration platforms. It also puts a spotlight on constraints - capital intensity, security, and skills - that could slow adoption if not addressed.
For smart tangibles, this backdrop legitimizes bets on more capable silicon, better radios, and software investment around model lifecycle and fleet management. It also makes it easier to argue for modular designs that can absorb future AI workloads instead of locking products into today’s capabilities.
Signals to Watch
How often edge AI metrics and narratives appear in public earnings calls, especially for infrastructure and semiconductor vendors.
Shifts in venture and corporate investment toward companies that manage lifecycle, orchestration, and security for large fleets of intelligent devices.
Emerging regulation around AI at the edge, particularly where safety critical or privacy sensitive data is processed locally.
The extent to which edge AI shows up in RFPs for smart infrastructure, not just in pilot projects.
Key Links
AI in edge computing market forecast to 2032 from DataM Intelligence. https://www.datamintelligence.com/research-report/ai-in-edge-computing-market
5. Matter 2026 status review highlights progress - and platform friction
Matter and Thread are maturing quickly, but inconsistent platform implementations risk confusing users and product teams.
An in depth 2026 status review of the Matter standard notes real progress across several fronts. Thread 1.4 is extending battery life by optimizing behavior for sleepy devices, while the range of Matter certified products has expanded across both consumer and professional segments, with brands like ABB, Maco, Warema, and Ikea adding Thread and Matter support. The article estimates more than 750 products listed, indicating that the ecosystem has moved beyond early pilot stages.
At the same time, the review highlights stubborn fragmentation. Major platforms differ in which Matter versions and clusters they implement, leading to odd gaps - for example, certain leak sensors or remotes working in some ecosystems but not others, despite carrying the same standard logo. Users are often left guessing about which features will actually function, and the Distributed Compliance Ledger is not yet a reliable source of clear, consumer friendly information.
For smart tangible product teams, the message is twofold. First, Matter and Thread are progressing fast enough that betting against them is increasingly risky. Second, you cannot assume that “supports Matter” is a complete answer: you still need to understand which versions and clusters your target platforms implement, and plan UX and documentation around real world behavior, not just spec sheets. Transparent communication about supported features becomes a product differentiator in its own right.
Signals to Watch
Platform roadmaps for full Thread 1.4 and newer Matter releases, particularly where they affect battery powered sensors and controllers.
Vendor behavior around logos and labeling - whether they rely solely on the Matter logo or add clearer, product specific compatibility charts.
Growth of alternative Matter controllers and servers (for example, open source platforms) that may fill gaps left by the big ecosystems.
Whether regulators or consumer organizations start to push for clearer disclosures on smart home standards support.
Key Links
“The Matter Standard in 2026 - A Status Review” – independent overview of progress and remaining gaps. https://matter-smarthome.de/en/development/the-matter-standard-in-2026-a-status-review/
From TheRoad / Smart Tangibles
Previous issue: Smart Tangibles News Digest #2602 - CES 2026 special on Matter, edge AI, and smart play
Deep dive and case submissions: Smart Tangibles case study submission page - share real world examples of connected products, smart infrastructure, and service backed hardware.
Smart Tangibles book progress: The manuscript is incorporating new chapters on edge orchestration, domain specific IoT platforms (like smart retail), and security baselines for long lived devices.
How to Use This Digest
Treat these stories as prompts for roadmap reviews - where should your next generation hardware assume edge AI, higher security baselines, or Matter and Thread as default plumbing.
Use the “Signals to Watch” bullets as inputs to risk registers and opportunity maps, especially around lifecycle management, platform dependencies, and standards adoption.
Bring one story per week into cross functional discussions between product, hardware, security, and operations to stress test assumptions about stacks and partners.
For strategy and finance teams, map the market and standards trends here against your own unit economics and portfolio bets to see where assumptions are shifting under your feet.
If you find this useful, share it with a colleague or subscribe for future issues at theroadtlv.com.
This news digest is compiled weekly. Register here to receive it in your inbox.