Using iControl Networks' OpenHome software platform, Time Warner's IntelligentHome allows users to manage thermostats and lighting controls to save energy using a touchscreen monitor.
By Ashley Willis
REDWOOD CITY, Calif. — Through a new partnership, broadband home management software provider iControl Networks will power Time Warner Cable's IntelligentHome solution using iControl's OpenHome software platform.
With IntelligentHome, users can view video and monitor their homes remotely via smartphone or tablet computers. Additionally, they can control, schedule and automate thermostats and lighting controls to save energy. Time Warner also provides 24/7 monitoring, as it operates its own Five-Diamond rated emergency response center.
The partnership between iControl and Time Warner has been in the works for quite some time, iControl Networks Vice President of Marketing Greg Roberts tells SSI.
"We've been working with Time Warner, as well as Comcast and Rogers Communications, collectively on a broadband management solution specifically catered to their businesses," he says. "Those businesses are dramatically different than the traditional home security market, which has an ecosystem of hardware and devices that the entire industry uses."
Roberts stressed that iControl continues to work with home security companies. For example, iControl developed a solution that connects its software platform to existing home security equipment to create a more streamlined installation for the installer. Currently, the company powers ADT's Pulse product, as well as DSC's Connect24 Interactive service.
"Our approach to the home security industry has been less about trying to do business deals with a bunch of home security companies," Roberts says. "It's about going to companies that can resell our solution. With our DSC partnership, they already have relationships with home security companies and central station monitoring stations. That way, DSC can provide all the tools to those regional and local companies and offer a more interactive home energy/home management solution."
Roberts says that the deployment solutions they offer are customizable by customer, and user interfaces for the solutions provided for cable companies are different from the solutions provided to home security businesses.
"The features and functionalities for broadband home management are somewhat similar between all our customers, but the user experience is dramatically different," he says. "It's based on the consumer research we've done, specific for each one of our deployment partners to best meet their customers' needs."
However, for security companies to remain in business, Roberts notes that they must embrace offering interactive security services before telcos and cable companies take all the customers.
"The connected home market is now evolving, and it's evolving through home security," he says. "You've got the top two cable companies in the country offering a robust interactive home security solution. It's dire that security companies adapt this technology, whether it's with iControl or another company. That's what it's going to take to survive, and now is the time to do it."
Ashley Willis is associate editor for SECURITY SALES & INTEGRATION. She can be reached at (310) 533-2419.