I see the value of what you are proposing but that would be useful only for tech savvy users (vs mainstream)...

If you also sell the optional local storage device (a network video recorder), then at least you give your customers the option.

Otherwise, you are not materially different from Ring or Google.

Thanks for the feedback. Our cameras have local storage but we do the inference on the cloud. Our main value prop is more powerful event detection features beyond what Nest is offering (Ring is not really offering any as of now.) and at a significantly lower price...

I 100% disagree. Mainstream people ask tech savvy people to help all the time. And, importantly, paid-for cloud services should IMO also make their services available over sftp. Not doing so is a large contributing reason I don't use those services.