Amazon yanks Sengled's Alexa skill after a series of service outages

After more than a month of sporadic outages that left many Sengled smart bulb users struggling to control their lights, Amazon has opted to pull the skill that allowed Sengled users to control their bulbs with Alexa. Some Sengled bulbs may still offer Alexa control directly via Zigbee, Matter, or Bluetooth connectivity, thus bypassing the yanked Alexa skill. But Sengled bulbs that can't be connected directly to Alexa will no longer be controllable via the voice assistant, Amazon said. Sengled lights and devices may still be controllable using the Sengled app or other smart home platforms, although the status of those connections still appears to be spotty. "We hold a high bar for the Alexa experience," an Amazon spokesperson told TechHive.