Apple has pulled the venerable Nest smart thermostat from its retail and online stores in the wake of a series of new HomeKit products, Mashable reports. Originally designed by former Apple engineers Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers, the Nest thermostat was at the leading edge of connected smart home products and considered by many to be inspired by an Apple design ethos, particularly when Apple became one of the first retailers to sell the device in 2012. While there was some speculation as to whether the Nest would continue to be sold in Apple stores when the company was acquired by Apple’s rival Google early last year, the placement of the product in stores remained largely unchanged.
Over the past year, however, Apple has made several moves to streamline the collection of products sold in its stores and remove products that either compete or don’t fit into the company’s more recent initiatives. For example, Fitbit wearable fitness trackers were removed last October after being slow to integrate with the new iOS 8 HealthKit framework, and Jawbone’s Up and Nike’s FuelBand followed in March shortly before the release of Apple’s own fitness solution in the form the Apple Watch. With the removal of the Nest coming as Apple begins selling the HomeKit-enabled EcoBee 3, this seems to herald a similar move of Apple selling only HomeKit integrated accessories in its stores.
