Honeywell sues to protect home thermostat patents

By Leslie Brooks Suzukamo

The commonplace wall thermostat is becoming a battleground in the war to control the digital "smart home."
In a federal lawsuit filed Monday in Minneapolis, industrial giant Honeywell claims a California company called Nest Labs infringes on its patents for programmable home thermostats.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court, seeks to stop Nest Labs and retailer Best Buy from selling Nest Labs' thermostat line and to recover damages.
The Honeywell business that produces its thermostats is based in Golden Valley.
Nest Labs' website says its thermostat, the Nest, learns over time how homeowners want to heat and cool their homes and is less complicated to use than other programmable thermostats.
The Nest also is a wireless "smart" appliance that lets homeowners log onto the Internet to make changes.
Honeywell alleges Palo Alto-based Nest Labs infringed on seven of its patents. Some relate to simplified methods for operating and programming a thermostat, while other patents cover user interfaces to program the devices to save energy as well as the thermostat's inner design, Honeywell says.
"Competition is good and we welcome it, but we will not stand by while competitors, large or small, offer products that infringe on our intellectual property," said Beth Wozniak, president of Honeywell's Environmental and Combustion Controls business in a statement.
Last year, Honeywell's Automation and Control Solutions division, which includes its thermostat

business, made $2.08 billion - more than any of the Morris Township, N.J.-based company's other divisions, even aerospace, according to its latest financial statement. Representatives from Nest Labs and Richfield-based Best Buy declined comment.
Devices like the Nest are part of the movement toward the digitally connected "smart home," said Brian Langenberg, a financial analyst who follows Honeywell at his firm, Langenberg & Co., in Chicago.
The desire - and now the ability - to save energy and money with smart thermostats is spurring innovations in building controls and other chores that once were ignored, he said.
Honeywell gets about 10 percent of its operating profit from licensing its intellectual property, so naturally it is going to jealously guard against any potential loss of revenue from patent infringement, Langenberg said.
"Basically, they're doing what the 800-pound gorilla does, which is if it moves, sit on it," he said of Honeywell's reaction to its competition.
But upstarts like Nest Labs pose little threat to Honeywell, he added.
"If the product is that good, (Honeywell) or somebody else would buy them out," he said.
Honeywell said it has filed two other lawsuits recently alleging infringement of thermostat and combustion control patents. The other companies are Venstar Inc. of Chatsworth, Calif., and ICM Controls of North Syracuse, N.Y., the company said.
Leslie Brooks Suzukamo can be reached at 651-228-5475. Follow him at