Smart Home Trending: Investing in the Smart Home

Popular Smart Home Links Shared (Week of 30 October – 05 November)

Summary – With 5.3K shares this past week, traffic was down from the 7.9K shares of the week before. In addition to a red herring regarding makeup that uses the title of “Smart House” there are four pieces that surround either funding or the launch of solutions for the Smart Home space. As a result, let’s call the theme of the week “Investing in the Smart Home.” Whether through internal or external funding, there is no doubt that plenty of money has been, and will continue to be, funneled into the Smart Home space.

Sevenhugs Remote – What do you name a company when your founders have seven children among you? It appears that you name the company “Sevenhugs.” This company has been focusing on sleep sensors, but received 391 shares of their soon-to-be-released one-touch remote. Either Sevenhugs is executing a very clever marketing move to keep customers guessing, or my observation skills are poor (perhaps both). You can register on the web to get 50% off the remote, but I can’t seem to find either the price or the release date of this product. Regardless, I like the family emphasis and look forward to seeing the product come out.

Sunflower Labs Funding – Would you like to have drones patrolling your house, as shown above? In an article with 357 shares, Techcrunch writes about startup Sunflower Labs receiving funding for a security system whose motion sensors activate a quadcopter that is dispatched to investigate unusual disturbances on your property. The exact release date is a bit vague, but for $25, feel free to reserve yours online if you like.

Ernest Funding – Just like my previous newsletter, Arturs Pumpurs crowdfunding idea for “Ernest, your first mobile butler” made it into the top shared stories. As I type this, it has received roughly $17.3K from 48 backers and has 28 days to go. With an additional 276 shares (after 277 the previous week), it is clear that there is always interest is funding a startup with an interesting idea.

Ecobee Thermostat – Ecobee launched their new Ecobee3 Lite thermostat on the 21st of October. They have done a great job of continued activity to promote the new product, giving it life for a sustained two week period with 223 additional shares of the product page on their website.

With a “tweener” price-point of $169 (roughly midway between low-end and high-end smart thermostats), and support of five major Smart Home platforms, this product is aiming to be the Goldilocks of thermostats. As consumer reviews roll-in over the coming days and weeks, the Argus team will be checking to see delivery on that brand promise.

Make up Red Herring – Although the most highly shared link with 466 last week, the lead story was only marginally Smart Home. There were two virtually identical twitter postings, for Makeup with Laura and a different Makeup oriented handle, that both used the “Smart House” tagline and made it into the Smart Home social media listings. It goes to show you that raw numbers don’t tell the whole story and it is important to analyze the stories behind the numbers to separate the signal from the noise.