The Open Connectivity Foundation (OCF), sponsor of the IoTivity open source project, and AllSeen Alliance, which provides the AllJoyn® open source Internet of Things (IoT) framework, announced that the two organizations’ boards have approved a merger under the OCF name.

The Thread Group and EEBus Initiative e.V announced that the two alliances will collaborate in their efforts to build interoperable solutions for the smart home. As a result of this alliance, the organizations expect their members will benefit from access to key shared resources.

The residential Internet of Things (IoT) trend is expected to continue to grow during the next decade, particularly as industry stakeholders meet the demand for integrating disparate devices and in-home systems.

The worldwide Internet of Things (IoT) market is projected to hit a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 33.3 percent to 2021 driven by the rising need for operational efficiency and the increasing penetration of connected devices, according to a report available from RnR Market Research.

Technavio’s latest report on the global Internet of Things (IoT) devices market provides an analysis of the key trends expected to impact the market from 2015 to 2019.

Gartner Inc. forecasts that 6.4 billion connected devices will be in use worldwide in 2016, up 30 percent from 2015, and will reach 20.8 billion by 2020. In 2016, 5.5 million new devices will get connected every day.