There is absolutely no added value in the cloud server, it exists merely to justify subscriptions and to collect intelligence about the users. The industrial world has been handling much more complex automation tasks than the typical home user for decades and its never needed 24/7 Internet access, cloud servers and what-have-you. (...and its never needed constant firmware updates, either). The domestic world shouldn't need sophisticated back ends except for doing bleeding edge stuff like decoding natural speech and other environmental signals (the control itself is trivial).
Ultimately its a failure of the business model. Our industry can't compete by making things, it can only compete by buying imported (from China, usually) things and renting them to people.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
