The Atari brand name will soon adorn connected devices across home, pets, lifestyle and safety, if a new international deal with Sigfox achieves its goal.
Atari is back, partnering with internet of things (IoT) company Sigfox to develop a whole new line of devices. The news comes a bit out of the blue as quite little had been known of the former gaming great Atari since it encountered financial difficulties a few years ago.
Choosing Sigfox as a partner, though, is quite a solid move. The French company recently expanded its IoT network into 100 US cities, connecting everything from factory robots to smoke alarms, washing machines, smartwatches and interactive billboards.
Currently operating in 18 countries and registering more than 7m devices in its network, Sigfox was funded last year to the tune of $115m. In the IoT world, it’s a major operator.
The agreement doesn’t reveal too many details, though Atari claims the line of connected devices will range from the very simple to the highly sophisticated. The initial product line will include categories such as home, pets, lifestyle and safety, though Atari’s roots won’t be dismissed.
Ludovic Le Moan, CEO of Sigfox, said Atari has disruption “rooted in its DNA”, adding that his company’s established network was perfect for launching “a new dimension to gaming”.
For anyone thinking Atari’s name has diminished since the halcyon days of Asteroids and Centipede, you’re way off. Last August, 881 previously buried Atari games were sold for more than $100,000 on eBay.
That was 881 of the 728,000 copies of the infamous ET game released in haste back in the early 1980s.
Atari image via Tinxi/Shutterstock
