Awareness and interest in energy management applications are growing among consumers, and home area networks offering access to energy consumption data will become part of a broader connected home ecosystem.
As TMC’s special guest contributor, Mary Miller, wrote in October 2010, “Smart Grid” should not be defined simply in terms of new technology for energy conservation, generation and distribution. There’s another component to being smart – communication – and it is essential to the success of America’s new energy initiatives.” In the effort to go green and transition utilities to the smart grid, people have become captivated by energy savings and waste reduction, making it a part of their personal lifestyle. And, nothing says personal like bringing the smart grid and smart energy to one’s home. Are you a smart home owner?
Control4 hopes so, as it invests in smart home owners like you. Control4, a home energy startup, previously raised $17.3 million largely to launch a division to connect its wireless home products with smart meters, smart grid services and utilities. Control4 plans to provide at least 20,000 of Control4′s home energy devices and software to Nevada utility NV Energy, which in the utility world, 20,000 home energy devices is a sizable deployment.
More and more home owners are joining the Green campaign and focusing on energy conservation, generation, distribution and communication. You do your small part and Control4 and Cisco with take on a larger role. Cisco has made an equity investment in Control4, of an unknown size, following an already generous investment of $15 million in a previous funding round. The router giant has also created a distribution partnership with Control4 as a type of non-exclusive agreement to provide Control4’s home operating system in projects with specific cities and utilities. For instance, Cisco is working with the city of Incheon in South Korea to build connected homes that will include Control4 home energy products, as well as Cisco’s building automation technology and telepresence video conferencing.
Jaclyn Allard is a IoTevolutionworld Web Editor. She most recently worked on the production team at Juran Institute, a quality consulting firm producing its own training and marketing materials. Previously, she interned at Curbstone Press, a nonprofit publishing press in Willimantic, CT, and fulfilled the role of Editor-in-Chief for the literature and arts journal published by the University of Connecticut. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Jaclyn Allard
