This week I presented my experience with home automation at the Davinci Institute . I'm a big fan of Futurist Thomas Frey, and was happy to participate on that side of the podium. In this particular "Evening with a Futurist," Thomas asked two us to talk. I spoke from a consumer perspective, and shared my motivations, accomplishments; and lessons from home automation. Tim Enwall "Head of all Things Corporate" at Mobiplug spoke about the future from the perspective of a young home automation start-up.
Our two presentations actually flowed perfectly together, almost rehearsed, even though I had never met Tim before, or knew anything about Mobiplug.
The slides from my presentation are here .
(There there is a mistake in my slides - I said that Home Automation Inc. was acquired by Lurtron, but it was Leviton that had actually acquired it.)
The key point I made was that we are on the cusp of a home automation revolution. That the home automation industry has been held back by a handful of factors, but wiring and costs being the big ones. You see, a lot of home automation requires specialized wiring. Builders don't wire new homes, because it doesn't raise the value. Once the home is built, it becomes too hard/costly to get the wiring done. The result is most home automation either happens as a result of remodel/new construction by someone that really wants it, or gets lightly implemented with technologies that don't require special cabling.
In my home, special cabling was primarily required for thermostats and controllers. Moving forward, there's far more choices for wireless technologies (Zigbee, Z-Wave, Bluetooth, wi-fi, etc.), and hard-wired controllers are being replaced with smartphones and other low cost transmitters.
Additionally, the esoteric nature of the industry has typically required a specialized dealer network. That kept the technologies out of the hands of the direct consumer and simultaneously raised prices. Today's consumers are empowered and prefer to engage direct.
The smartphone craze is about to liberate home automation. Not only from a wiring and controller point of view, but so many new technologies are becoming available for smartphone control. This includes thermostats, lighting, security, music, and much more. That's the good news, the bad news is that each of these products has different apps. It can become unwieldy to create something like a movie night experience. Coincidentally, both Tim and I used a movie night example in our presentations.
Mobiplug is an interesting concept. The company isn't shipping a product yet, but is developing a new type of platform that controls other platforms. The idea is its hardware can "speak" to numerous systems including music, lighting, security, etc. through each system's native format while presenting the user a single smartphone interface and application. A movie night macro could talk Zigbee to the thermostats, INSTEON to the lights, IR to some devices, and Wi-Fi to others all from a single macro. Each solution is independently acquired from partner vendors. It's a great concept.
I can see this model working in the near-term future for popular apps/devices, but it might be a while until it controls things like fireplaces and garage doors. An added benefit is that homeowners can jump into home automation gradually. Too often, construction and other activities force a homeowner to commit in a big way early in the process (and that keeps many from committing).
Tim and I both agreed (via our presentations) that as the barriers come down to the technology including direct to consumer services and lower costs, the sector will see huge growth.
I built my system some five years ago. I could see something like Mobiplug offering 80% of the functionality my system has for about 20% of the cost in the next few years. That type of change in accessibility will have huge impacts. It will be interesting to watch.
via Examiner National Edition Gadgets & Tech Channel Articles http://www.examiner.com/article/the-future-of-home-automation?cid=roadrunner