Back in April, Google-owned Nest reported that it would no longer be selling its Nest Protect smoke and carbon monoxide alarm. The problem was with a particular feature called Nest Wave, which allowed users to turn the alarm off by waving their hand in front of it—Nest's own testing apparently uncovered "a unique combination of circumstances" that could unintentionally disable the alarm. This is obviously a deal-breaker for a smoke detector, so the company stopped selling the device and issued a software update to Internet-connected Nest Protects that disabled Nest Wave. As of April, 440,000 Nest Protects had already been sold or were sitting on shelves waiting to be sold.
Now the New York Times reports that Nest is ready to resume sales of the Protect, albeit with Nest Wave still disabled. The company is still working to re-enable the feature in a future software update, but in the meantime the Nest Protect will return to store shelves with a new $99 price tag, $30 less than before. The Nest Protect still retains its other "smart" features, including the ability to notify users of alarms via their smartphones.
One other Nest product, the Nest Learning Thermostat, is available through the Google Play Store and traditional retail channels. Now that the Protect is returning to store shelves, it's a safe bet that Google will begin selling it through its own online store as well. Google bought Nest back in January for $3.2 billion, though the company has yet to announce any new products since the acquisition.
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