Smart Home | Home Automation Trends

Home Automation Trends Converge To Drive Worldwide Adoption

By Ben Flux

Operations Director, Touch Panel Control

Imagine ‘tweeting’ a command on Twitter to control the settings of your home equipment. Sounds far-fetched? Far from it. In his article titled ‘Growing the Connected Home Ecosystem’ as part of theConsumer Electronics Association’s annual 5 Technology Trends to Watch report, Ben Arnold writes about an engineer who does precisely that! In the world of consumer electronics, ‘convergence’ is a ubiquitous word; even so, the convergence of home automation systems with social networking is a major new trend.

‘Smart homes’ and the home automation market poised for rapid growth

A recent study forecasts the global smart homes market to touch $13.4 billion by 2014, growing at a CAGR of 16.5% from 2009 to 2014. Apart from the worldwide demographic shift owing to a rise in the ageing population, other factors expected to contribute to this boom include government initiatives as well as rising personal incomes, particularly in Asia.

Similarly, ABI Research predicts that home automation system shipments will exceed $11.8 billion in value by 2015, encompassing the luxury, mainstream, DIY and managed segments of the home automation market. While the study also highlighted a significant lack of awareness about home automation systems, it concludes that the market is reaching an inflection point as vendors and integrators adopt various strategies to increase penetration. The three key areas that are taking this industry to the tipping point are energy management, home control and security.

Mobile (smart) telephony, wireless Internet connectivity takes home automation mainstream

According to the CEA, over 50 per cent of US households own a laptop computer and more than one-fourth have a smart phone. Consequently, home automation system manufacturers have moved fast to facilitate the use of their products using these smart devices.

The availability of custom applications contributed by developers from around the world, specially built for these devices— particularly iPhones and iPads—has changed the market irreversibly, albeit very positively. To put it simply, home automation systems have been made more accessible, significantly less expensive, and considerably more user-friendly.

Applications driving greater adoption

Residential security/ home monitoring stands out as one of the key drivers of home automation systems. As a segment that addresses our inherent fear of loss, this sector has received a serious impetus with the advancements in mobile technology and Internet connectivity.

Similarly, the ability to control and reduce expenditure on utilities with remote energy management will help penetrate home automation systems into more homes. Whether it is switching off lights or regulating the thermostat from anywhere in the world, energy management powered by smart phones and tablet PCs (the category that the iPad probably fits in best) is an extremely attractive proposition. In fact, some experts predict that energy management will be the future of the home automation industry.

Further, users will be keen to use the same system to control other systems at home such as home entertainment systems.

The market is likely to open up for a new category of users capable of self-installing their home automation systems, as these systems become much simpler and inexpensive to use. The fact that stand-alone applications are also offered will also entice first-time buyers or smaller-home users to adopt such systems.

The health sector is also forecast to be an important driver of home automation applications in the near future. According to Parks Associates, the wireless home healthcare market is expected to grow to $4.4 billion by 2013. For example, the CEA report points to products that can be brought online at home to facilitate remote monitoring and treatment of patients as well as specialized devices designed to monitor health diagnostics or manage pain and medication levels. While tele-medicine is not new as a concept, the greater adoption of home automation systems connected to the Internet is bound to make a serious impact in this space.

Control and convenience

The smart home automation ecosystem today focuses primarily on security and utility management, giving users real-time control over almost all the mechanisms in the house. As Ben Arnold writes in the CEA report, “Consumers now can control all of the home’s systems while at home or away. The result is smart, real-time control over virtually every mechanism in the house. The goal of this interconnected Web of actions is a smarter, more energy efficient home tailored to the homeowner’s lifestyle.” We will also continue to see the transformation of the mobile phone in parallel with home automation adoption: from a device that has evolved to handle 3 Cs – Communication, Content, Commerce- we can now add a 4th one: Control.
Ben Flux is an entrepreneur and angel investor with multiple businesses in the realms of Web-based services and mobile applications. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.