With the prevalence of the IoT trend together with Singapore’s push as a Smart Nation, Smart Home, the home of the future becomes a common topic and feature which we see launching across various residential projects in town.

Smart Home, essentially home automation coupling with inbuilt functional algorithm and logic isn’t something new nor was it a birth child of IoT. In actual fact, Home automation solutions has been around for decades. They had been mostly wired solution which are activated by a control tablet and mostly affordable by the affluent due to the upfront investment costs for these lifestyle convenience solutions.

However, with IoT, day to day devices and appliances are built to be communicable with each other without wiring. This cause entry barrier of home automation to drop significantly due to the high penetration of wireless network that allows wireless devices to connect with each another without cabling works. But do not be mistaken by the above statement, that by getting some wireless devices that are controllable by Mobile or Tablet interface automatically qualify the solution as “Smart”.

App or direct device control most of the time would be termed mostly, “Smart Control”. As like the following example: You used to toggle the channel of your television set with an infra-red remote control. Now a mobile App has been created for the Television set which allow you to control the Television via your phone. In this manner, does it make your television smarter? Sure, the wireless controlling of the television beats traditionally infra-red remote controller that allows you to connect to the television even when you are away from home. But the viewing of the solution to be smart in this instance would be rather, subjective.

With the waves after waves of smart propaganda and the talk of all these being the next industrial revolution, it may be slightly overwhelming for a home owner to differentiate smart solutions being a need or want as the market is still in the infant stage. The landscape for this presently is somewhat similar to about 10 years ago, when Smart Phones were first rolled out with many observing how the first movers experience it.

Industry experts, trend observers and researchers as bet on the wide adoption of smart home solutions within the next couple of years globally and south east asia is a hot spot with Singapore taking the lead. As a home owner, will smart home become integrated with your lifestyle as like smart phones? Something worth to give a though over according to your lifestyle requirement.