Opportunity for what ? Selling your data? No thanks. Stick with dumb router folks.
The opportunity to maintain even a tenuous foothold in the growing IoT/home automation/networking market.
The opportunity to keep its hardware business diversified.
The opportunity to own/operate a company that was a pioneer in mesh networking, even if it meant operating it as a separate entity. Instead, Apple has spent $3B on a fashion headphone company, in an acqui-hire where those principals are no longer even part of the company.
What is Apple's home strategy? Whatever it is, it's not working.
"Works with Alexa/Google" is nearly ubiquitous. "Works with HomeKit" is often more of a question where the answer is "no."
Yes, Apple made HomeKit hard to implement, and with high privacy safeguards. But even after the effort to make it easier, HomeKit still lags, and has been relegated to second-class citizen in IoT.
Past Apple peripherals, including AirPorts and printers, weren't necessary the biggest sellers. But they were first-party reference quality products that showed users and third-parties the template for what could be done, and how it could be done.
Apple's reliance on third-parties to promote HomeKit has failed, but Cupertino doesn't seem to notice. Now it's left to play catch up to Amazon and Google.
Those two can be rightly criticized for their privacy stances, but privacy and home automation aren't mutually exclusive. Where are the options for such products that do respect privacy, in line with Apple's stated principles? There is demand for that, but choices are limited.
The Home market is one that Apple has entirely failed to recognize, seize, and capitalize on. HomePod was already too little, too late, and ain't gonna do it.