A new report from CEDIA this week features data on the characteristics of companies working within the residential electronics systems industry in the U.S. and Canada, revealing the current number of installation companies in the industry, the size of the workforce, trends, forecasts and the economic state of the industry.

“The theme of 2013 is definitely ‘Turning the Corner,’” said Erica Shonkwiler, CEDIA senior director of research. “Installation companies are experiencing a year of solid growth, which aligns with industry indicators. If the year continues as projected, the third and fourth quarters will be even stronger than the first two.”

The full report will be available in December; however, preliminary findings reveal:

• Systems Integration / AV Installation companies expect 2013 to end with a 16 percent increase in gross revenue, a 15.6 percent increase in the number of residential projects, and a 12.3 percent increase in the size of residential projects over 2012.
• Respondents only expect 11 percent of their TV sales in the next 12 months to come from Ultra-HD/4K sets, indicating the need for content to catch up in order for sales to increase.
• At this time, cloud-based content management is not believed to be having a negative impact on company hardware sales, with 60 percent of respondents indicating no change in sales and 16 percent indicating the cloud-based options have had a positive impact on their hardware sales.

“While enjoying the growth, installation company owners are still cautiously optimistic,” said Shonkwiler. “Their caution stems from the unknown impacts of trends in cloud-based content streaming and management, app-based control solutions, internet-connected wireless audio systems, and the continued entry of telecoms into the market. Company owners expect these trends will increase consumer awareness of the industry, but many are still unsure which trends will have a net positive impact on their company.”

In addition to working on this report, CEDIA recently released its annual Benchmarking Survey Reports, which evaluate the internal operations of home technology professional companies in the U.S. and Canada.

Research updates, project details, and report availability will be posted here.