How tighter ties between Google and Nest can bring new value to the Google Tax

Google announced yesterday that Nest will no longer be a standalone division of parent company Alphabet. Instead, the team that makes luxury smart home gadgets will live under the Google umbrella in an effort to tighten the integration between the gadgets in our homes and the Google Assistant that lives in our phones. On the surface, it seems like a beautiful marriage of hardware and AI. As Google so succinctly puts it, the goal is to "create a home that's safer, friendlier to the environment, smarter and even helps you save money." Google has designs on rivaling Apple in the high-end hardware space, but right now many of the Made by Google products are expensive but not necessarily premium.