Blog articles from 02/2018

The desire to create net-zero energy homes has persisted for decades, and now it is becoming financially viable to build these homes. Yet, while some of the components needed to build a net-zero home are cost competitive, other components are not. At the ninth-annual Smart Energy Summit , Parks Associates and a panel of industry leaders will examine the competitive landscape for energy efficiency and the implications for home energy management as builders move on the path to...

Before speaking at Parks Associates' annual Smart Energy Summit , Wayne Morrison, Principal, Emerging Technologies, Reliant shared his thoughts on the biggest and latest opportunities for utlities in the energy business: How has the smart home created new service opportunities for energy providers? Smart home technology has created a wide range of opportunities for energy providers to integrate devices that help make customers lives easier and homes more comfortable and...

Before participating at Parks Associates' ninth-annual Smart Energy Summit in Austin, Prateek Chakravarty, Head of Worldwide Sales, Bidgely recently provided insight on challenges and opportunities of the energy industry. What are the barriers to bringing together a broad ecosystem of smart home products that work together as an energy management system? Hardware is expensive, so investing in multiple smart home devices can be impractical for many consumers. Likewise, with...

The next major evolution in computing is here – voice technology dominates CES. Voice assistants are here to stay. At the beginning of 2017, half of U.S. broadband households were using a personal assistant through an application or dedicated device. Market leaders such as Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft, and more recently Samsung continue to announce new product enhancements and expanded roadmaps. The competition among these giants was evident at CES with a plethora of...

Before speaking at Parks Associates' Smart Energy Summit: Engaging the Consumer in Austin, Gene Wang, CEO at People Power, answered several key questions on current and future trends within the energy industry: What are the barriers to bringing together a broad ecosystem of smart home products that work together as an energy management system? Different manufacturers with different agendas, lots of protocols and standards, different communication rates, data policies that...

Guest post by   Thomas Rockmann, VP Connected Home, Deutsche Telekom   It is a fact that the global population is increasing, and the overall age weighting is changing. The world population is expected to hit 8.6 billion in 2030, 9.8 billion in 2050, and 11.2 billion in 2100. In parallel, the global populace is gradually aging, and nowhere more than in Western Europe. One in three UK babies born in 2013 is expected to reach 100 in the UK alone , and the elderly...

The smart home today is not really all that smart. It is obedient and does what it is told to do, but has limited capability of making decisions on its own. Decision making requires first, an understanding of the situation, and then a method to make a decision based on the situation. The smart home industry must focus on understanding what is happening in and around the home, and the first step in understanding that context is gathering data. The sensors embedded in...

Approximately one-half of smart home device owners experience problems when setting up their devices, according to Parks Associates research. Consumers continue to rely on operators for the majority of home networking solutions and expect simplified user experiences across multiple interfaces from setup to daily operation. By addressing support issues, service providers can become the drivers of the connected home market. In the infographic below, Parks Associates highlights...