Written by Dino K.
In this edition of the Smart Home Founder Series, we sit down with Dorthe Gårdbo-Pedersen and Martin Langballe from frient to explore how their ideas took shape, what inspires their design philosophy, and how they see the smart home evolving.
frient is a Danish smart home brand that blends simplicity, reliability, and thoughtful design with a friendly personality. Built entirely on Zigbee, frient focuses on sensors that improve safety, comfort, and energy efficiency, all while staying open and compatible with smart home platforms like Homey.
Hello Dorthe and Martin! Thanks for joining me today. The frient brand grew out of the Onics brand. Can you tell us about that relationship and what sparked the decision to launch frient as a separate brand?
MARTIN: “Thanks for having us! About five years ago, in October 2020, we launched the frient brand as a spin-off from Onics. Onics has always been a B2B company supplying high-end, white-label smart home products to OEM customers. Over time, we started receiving more and more requests from private consumers who wanted to buy our products directly.”
“We had to tell them no, as we didn’t have a structure for selling just a few devices to individuals. Our minimum order was usually in the thousands. Eventually, the board started asking how much potential profit we’re turning down, so we decided to test the idea. That’s how frient was born, as a consumer-facing brand built on the same quality and design that our professional customers already knew and trusted.”
DORTHE: “At first, we didn’t even plan to make the connection public. We wanted frient to stand on its own, without competing directly with our OEM partners. That’s also the main reason why we launched without a hub. We wanted frient to work seamlessly with existing smart home platforms like Homey.”
The name “frient” (with a ‘t’) is very clever, and I can see it being used a lot in marketing assets and documentation. Can you share the story behind creating it?
DORTHE: “It actually happened quite randomly. One afternoon, my colleague and I were brainstorming names and checking available domains. We needed a .com address, since it was mandatory.”
“After hours of ideas, we were both tired when ‘frient’ came up. Of course, ‘Friend’ with a d would never work, but adding the ‘t’ made it unique and gave it personality. It sounded friendly and playful, exactly what we were after. I had to negotiate with the domain owner, which was completely new to me, but we got it in the end. Then I registered the trademark, and the name just grew from there.”
You often mention “Danish design” in your product descriptions. Can you give a practical example, maybe using your Intelligent Smoke Alarm, of how that design philosophy influences the final look and feel of a device?
DORTHE: “For us, Danish design is about simplicity, function, and quality. It has to look good, but also make sense to use. We received many requests from our customers in Europe for smart devices that actually looked nice, such as smoke alarms that didn’t have to be hidden. That interest inspired both the product and our logo.”
“The smile that you see in our visuals actually comes from the product itself. The round lower part of its body of the Intelligent Smoke Alarm formed a beautiful curve, so we used that shape as the base for the frient ‘smile’ graphic. It became a symbol of friendliness and safety in one design element.”
“We also spent a lot of time defining the tone of voice. We moved far away from the corporate style and cold colors of our old B2B communication. frient uses bright colors and friendly wording. Sometimes we even leave small spelling mistakes on purpose, just to keep the tone light. Smart home technology is complicated behind the scenes, but the user experience must be simple and clear. That is what Danish design means to us.”
MARTIN: “I would like to note that our products are made with high-quality plastic that stays white even after years of sunlight. It might sound minor, but it matters for how a product ages in your home. We care about every detail, from the firmware to the physical materials. In the end, frient is about making products that care for you, your home, your belongings, and look great at the same time. That is where our slogan comes from: the shortcut to peace of mind.”
Let’s get into the tech behind frient. While many companies use Wi-Fi, you have built your entire brand on Zigbee. What are the practical advantages of Zigbee that made you commit to it so strongly?
DORTHE: “We have been part of the Zigbee Alliance, now the CSA, since the very beginning, even before it was officially called Zigbee. Some of our engineers helped develop the standard itself, and we were among the first companies to receive Zigbee certification.”
“Open standards have always been at the heart of what we do. From the start, we believed smart home technology should be accessible and work with everything else, not locked behind proprietary systems. In the early days, we competed with Z-Wave, which, interestingly, was also created by a Danish company, but it was a closed system and difficult to integrate. That experience only strengthened our belief in Zigbee and the importance of openness.”
Your sensors are also famous for their extremely long battery life. How much of that is a direct benefit of Zigbee, and how much is your own hardware and software engineering?
DORTHE: “It is a mix of both. Zigbee helps because it is efficient by design, but we have done a lot of optimization ourselves. Our strategy has always been to use standard, readily available batteries that people can buy at their local supermarket. That has had some consequences for the size of the products, as some of our devices are bigger than similar products on the market.”
“Battery life has always been a challenge for smart home devices, so we made it a goal to see how far we could go. Many of our customers use our devices in security or care systems, where no one wants to spend time replacing batteries. So we put a lot of effort into making them last, and I think we succeeded.”
Rather than creating a closed ecosystem, your products are compatible with many smart home hubs like Homey. Why was this open-platform strategy important to you, both from a business and a user perspective?
DORTHE: “It was the original idea we built the whole business on. Because we were part of the Zigbee Alliance, we heard that some of our colleagues in the market faced security challenges with other protocols.”
“When you’re building a home care solution or a home security solution, the actual security of the protocol is absolutely essential. Zigbee offered exactly what we wanted — an open, secure, and reliable foundation to build on.”
With the rise of Matter and Thread, what does the future look like for a dedicated Zigbee brand? How does this new standard affect your strategy?
MARTIN: “We follow Matter and Thread closely, of course, because they are part of the same overall movement. But we also learned, as early adopters of Zigbee, that being first comes with a cost. We made all the mistakes, learned from them, and helped others along the way.”
“This time we decided to wait and see where the market goes instead of jumping in too early. Thread is not that far from what we already know, since it is built on similar layers as Zigbee, so it is more of an evolution than something completely new. We are keeping an eye on it and will adapt when the time is right, but for now, Zigbee remains a strong and proven technology for us.”
What do you think is the single biggest misconception people have about the future of Zigbee now that Matter is here?
MARTIN: “That’s a really good question! I would say the biggest misconception is that Zigbee is outdated. It is not. Zigbee is still one of the most reliable and stable smart home technologies in the world. I can understand why people might think otherwise, since Matter and Thread are everywhere at trade shows and in the media.”
“For someone just entering the smart home space, it is easy to believe that everything old will be replaced. But that is not what is happening. Zigbee is well established, has millions of installed devices, and continues to evolve. It remains the backbone of many ecosystems, including Homey, and it is not going anywhere.”
DORTHE: “That is true, and I think the confusion mostly comes from new users. In more advanced communities, like Home Assistant or Homey users, people know that Zigbee still delivers the best balance between stability, security, and energy efficiency. It is a mature protocol that simply works.”
Your product line focuses a lot on safety, security, and energy monitoring. Are you planning to expand into other areas of the smart home?
MARTIN: “We are constantly discussing new products and exploring opportunities with our OEM partners. Sometimes they come to us asking for specific devices, like cameras or new types of sensors. We have even discussed internally adding millimeter-wave presence sensors, which are becoming increasingly popular.”
“Still, we only want to do it if we can do it properly. We do not just want to find a cheap module somewhere, put a frient logo on it, and call it a day. We want to ensure that products from frient are designed carefully. With the same attention to detail, battery performance, and quality that people expect from us. Developing hardware takes time, and we prefer to do fewer products but do them right.”
Looking back at all the products you have developed, is there one you are especially proud of? What would you call the hero product of the frient lineup?
MARTIN: “Our background is in the energy industry, so that part of our portfolio means a lot to us. We originally developed energy monitoring devices for utilities here in Denmark, and that experience shaped who we are. Products like our Electricity Meter Interface help users understand their energy use and make real changes, benefiting both customers and the environment.”
“But if we talk about a true hero product, it is the Intelligent Smoke Alarm. That one really took off. It combines safety, smart functions, and Danish design, and people simply love how it looks. Despite strong competition in this segment, we are selling even more smoke alarms this year than last, which speaks volumes. It has become a signature product for us.”
Based on your long history in this space, what’s the single most important piece of advice you’d give to other innovators looking to build smart home hardware?
MARTIN: (laughs) “Don’t do it!”
“But seriously, if you do, focus on open standards and reliability. The market is changing fast. Big utilities, internet providers, and retailers are all entering the smart home business, so your products have to work with everything else. Customers are not brand loyal anymore. They might have a lock from one company, a camera from another, and a smoke alarm from us, and they expect them all to work together in one app.”
“The other thing is that you need stable, well-made products. Once you start shipping large quantities, stability and quality become critical. We learned that through our OEM business, where we deliver in big volumes, and it has taught us the importance of building something that lasts. High quality and openness are the keys.”
Thanks for sharing the frient story, Dorthe and Martin!
MARTIN: “Nice talking to you, thanks for having us!”
