Kyle
Today’s perception on home automation is flawed, says Sentient Labs co-founder Joss Scholten. That is of course, except for Nest, the thermostat that learns your lifestyle and adjusts the temperature accordingly.
Scholten and his team at Sentient Labs, an Austin startup, hopes to take that machine learning found in the Nest thermostat and extend it’s reach to other automation products in your home.
“Nowadays home automation means you use a control panel, remote, tablet or smart phone to push a button..” Scholten told us at SXSW 2013. He believes that for the system to be truly automated it would require no button pushing at all.
The Sentient Labs team is working on technology that would learn your behaviors and then automate accordingly. They want you to be able to sit down on the couch, have the lights illuminate at the right level, your favorite tv program turn on and the temperature to adjust accordingly.
They want to take it even further and compensate automatically as ambient light starts to fade, or outside, or indoor temperatures increase or decrease. Imagine if your house knew when to turn the dishwasher on, or that you were the one at the front door and unlocked it, without using your smartphone or pressing a button.
The components to drive these futuristic technologies are already available. Sentient hopes to be the first company that takes advantage of them and incorporates them into the most automated of home automation systems.
Check out our video interview with Scholten below. For more information visit sentient.io