SAN RAMON, Calif.- A group of companies, led by Cisco, General Motors, Motorola, Sun Microsystems, and Texas Instruments, here today announced the formation of what appears to be yet another consortium for the emerging but confusing home-networking/automation markets.

Called the Internet Home Alliance (IHA), the consortium includes 3Com, Best Buy, Cisco, CompUSA, General Motors, Honeywell, Invensys, Motorola, New Power Co., Panasonic, Reliant Energy, Sears, Sun Microsystems, and Texas Instruments.

The new consortium will define and develop the critical "building blocks" to minimize barriers currently inhibiting the mass adoption of Internet-enabled services to the home, said Bill Kenney, president of IHA and vice president of home and online services for Sears.

This group will also work together to facilitate communications between other consortiums and companies involved in the home-networking/automation arenas, Kenney said.

Among those organizations include the Open Services Gateway Initiative (OSGi), the Home Automation & Networking Association (HANA), the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association (CEDIA), and ComTIA.

IHA is the one of several organizations looking to define the next-generation home-networking/automation market, although the consortium is quick to point out that it is not competing with the other groups.

Still, the home-networking/automation market is split between a plethora of competing and confusing standards based on local-area networking and wireless technologies, analysts said.

And even though home-networking/automation has been discussed at length for the last 20 years, the business has yet to take off due to the lack of standards and other problems.

IHA hopes to solve at least some of those issues, said Mike Moone, group vice president and general manager of Cisco's Consumer Line of Business. "The Alliance will work with all members of the industry, from service and content providers to home integrators and developers, to accelerate parallel industry growth," he said. "This will allow the industry to quickly deliver Internet lifestyle solutions that add value to consumers' lives."