Giving smart homes a voice. Voice control has captured the public’s imagination by showing the possibilities of connected living. Here we look at why this is good news for electricians and installers working in the smart homes market.
I’m always going to remember last Christmas as the year my family gathered around the kitchen table to shout commands at a little black tube.
It may seem like a bizarre fad but voice control is currently one of the most influential trends in the IoT arena, with major tech players like Google, Apple and Microsoft, developing products that give users the ability to access the internet, and interact with their devices and homes, verbally.
The Echo is the hardware behind e-commerce giant, Amazon’s entry into this market. The original device was first released in the USA in late 2014 and, according to analysis from the Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, Amazon has shifted 5.1 million units stateside since then. Enthusiasm for the product looks set to mirror that in Europe. In October 2016 Echo, and its sister device, the Dot was released in the UK and Germany and both have since lodged themselves firmly at the top of the e-commerce giant’s electronics best sellers list.
What does this mean for smart homes?
The technology within Echo allows users interact with and give instructions to Alexa, Amazon’s virtual personal assistant. So, if a user asks Alexa “What is the weather like in London?”, the Echo will connect to Alexa Voice Services (AVS) which will find the answer online and report it back through your Echo speaker.
However, Alexa can do more than just answer questions. By giving third-party developers access to the Alexa Skills Kit and Alexa Voice Services (AVS), Amazon is constantly increasing the functionality and depth of Alexa’s capabilities. Companies like Uber, Dominoes and Spotify have already contributed ‘Skills ‘which allow users to make purchases and interact with their products and services via their Echo. This means you can request a taxi, order a pizza and play your favourite album just by asking Alexa.
No longer limited to the confines of sci-fi movies, this technology is also opening a path towards the voice controlled home. Several prominent smart device manufacturers include Philips Hue lights, Nest and Lyric thermostats and Samsung SmartThings have started working with AVS, and the various other voice control platforms. Once linked to their voice control system, users can speak to their home, adjusting settings and creating custom scenarios that fit around their lifestyle.
What does this mean for professional installers?
The majority of these devices are consumer-facing, simple-smart solutions, that the user can install themselves.
This is great for the casual tech enthusiast but where is the opportunity for the professional installer?
Fully integrating an all singing, all dancing smart home can be a complex and costly procedure. These are barriers that will need to be traversed if the smart homes market is to really take off with the masses. Voice control can help with this. For those who aren’t digitally savvy, it is a lot easier to programme and give instructions verbally, providing users with the opportunity to interact with their homes in a more natural way. These solutions are also a lot more affordable and don’t require the labour of cabling infrastructures to be installed.
Voice control services are providing homeowners with an accessible way into controlling things like their heating and lighting systems and the concepts of creating rules and scenarios that will allow their home to automatically adjust to their preferences.
It falls some way short of a fully integrated smart home but it whets the appetite. Inevitably, when consumer demands surpass the capabilities of an off the peg smart device, they are going to require a more sophisticated solution. For that, they will require the guidance and expertise of a smart electrician to take their home to the next level.