19/10/2014 06:27 AST
Walk into a room and the television will sense your presence and flick to your favourite channel, tuck yourself into bed and the lights will automatically dim, run out of milk and the fridge will order some for you. This is the future of our homes and both Etisalat and du are looking to upgrade our villas and apartments to smart homes that communicate with us.
By the end of the first quarter of next year, du will offer its customers a full suite of smart home solutions from smart television to air conditioning and lighting for about US$2,000.
“Our own research shows that 48 per cent of people living in Abu Dhabi and Dubai want to live in a smart home,” said Ahmed Mokhles, executive vice-president of consumer business at du. “We will have three different layers of services to manage and pay for these services.”
The company is providing the connectivity, managed services and the entire automation and has created a mobile app that controls the appliances in the home.
But how much of this is a gimmick and how will customers respond?
“There is a lot of gimmickry at the moment and a lot of hype about smart homes,” said Tony Reid, chief operating officer of Europe, Middle East and Africa at Hitachi Data Systems. “It is a younger generation thing, it will become natural for 20-somethings and younger, they will embrace that new technology.”
Companies like Samsung and LG have already launched smart fridges, washing machines and vacuum cleaners that relay information back to the user’s mobile phone, from the number of eggs left in the fridge to choosing the right amount of detergent for a load.
“There is a lot of demand for ease,” said DY Kim, the president of LG Gulf. “There is more demand in this region for smart appliances but market acceptance is still low. The prices are still too high, if it becomes more affordable more people will buy.”
Given the investment in smart cities across the GCC, smart homes are considered an inevitability by many. The infrastructure is already in place, particularly in Abu Dhabi, the world’s most fibre-connected city, and Dubai’s Smart City 2020 plan will also encourage investment in smart homes.
“Smart cities are absolutely real and necessary because of the environment, security, transportation and communication, that all needs to be knitted together to build a smart city and then smart homes falls underneath it nicely,” said Mr Reid.
The concept of a smart home can be more than just automatically pulling back your curtains when stepping out of your bed in the morning. One US-based company, Birdi, has developed a smart smoke detector device which monitors not just smoke but carbon monoxide, dioxide, temperature, humidity and air quality as well as level of dust and pollen. The sensors relay the information back in real time to an app on the mobile phone and if the residents are in danger, it also alerts both the mobile and landline.
“Air quality affects health,” said Mark Belinsky, the chief executive at Birdi. “Air quality is the biggest indicator of quality of life, once we know what we’re breathing in it’s the first step to make it better.”
It is the emphasis on health that is likely to sway the mass market to upgrade to a smart home, rather than a wall that changes colour depending on your mood.
The National
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