New Orleans-based Home Automation Inc. (HAI) now has its Lumina Pro family product suite available in German, Portuguese, Spanish (European and Latin American), Chinese (simplified and traditional), Italian, Catalan and French languages.
New Orleans-based Home Automation, (HAI), added KZValve as its latest connectivity partner. KZValve manufactures motorized valves and controls for water supplies. By connecting a water control valve to an HAI home automation system, the water supply at the home or business can be controlled remotely from a cell phone.
The National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) of Rosslyn, Va., offers “The 5 Ls of Lighting: The Consumer’s Guide to Choosing Energy-Efficient Lighting.” Helpful to electronic system contractors, this educational guide for the transition to more energy-efficient lighting can be downloaded at www.lightbulboptions.org.
Smart electric meters are being deployed in increasing numbers around the world, but only now is the utility industry addressing the concern that the new meters may represent a weak link in the integrity of the electrical grid. Smart meters, which utilize two-way communications to improve energy management, automation and control on the grid, have often been rolled out to customers with little forethought about the potential security risks.
Who would have thunk it? Confusion and too many choices can create business opportunities for home electronic system contractors (ESCs), this time as the Internet and Web-enabled televisions come together for e-mails, social networking, sophisticated gaming, family picture shows and, especially, video on demand.
With the rapid proliferation of smart phones and tablets, homeowners are discovering the power that apps can have in home control and automation — and in business.
A little more than a year has passed since Apple introduced the iPad, and the impact it has had on daily life has been nothing short of revolutionary. An explosion of software applications for many mobile devices has been developed to give users the power at their fingertips to manage their work, social lives, and leisure activities — anytime, anywhere. Why not control their homes as well? Is there an app for that? Of course, there is — and it is good for business.
The broadcaster of 30 Rock and Days of Our Lives is now offering home security. Just since last October, Xfinity from Comcast, which also owns NBC Universal, rolled out home security and monitoring; ADT, the world’s biggest home security firm, introduced a multi-level lifestyle monitoring and control service; Verizon, one of the largest U.S. communications companies, with a recent iPhone deal and a cloud computing acquisition in hand, has its own home monitoring experiment in motion; APX Alarm Security Solutions Inc., Provo, Utah, the fifth-largest alarm monitoring company on the SDM 100, rebranded as Vivint™ and launched new products turning its focus from alarm monitoring to a focus on whole home automation and monitoring (see page 149 for more on APX’s rebrand as Vivint™). And that’s not an all-inclusive list.
smartHOME marketplace contains profiles of new products for the digital home. Check out all the products from audio-video receivers and digital locks, to the latest in remote controls.
The smartHOME news represents what is happening in the industry. Headlines include: Rebranding of APX Aims to Make Automation Mainstream; Glued to TV; HAI Devices Part of Home Energy Management Projects; Scholarship to Honor CEDIS's Vaughn; etc.
Avatar is so yesterday. After a push for home 3D-enabled televisions, spurred by the popularity of the movie, those 3D televisions are still a glimmer in the eyes of manufacturers as well as a dusty product on big box store shelves. Still, in the world of high definition, some TV makers, thanks to a Consumer Electronics Association-sponsored study, have recently shifted their programming to emphasize...