Wondrwall | Blog & News

Tipping point - world’s first intelligent home automation system launched

Written by Mark | Sep 21, 2018 8:58:38 AM

MANCHESTER, 00.01am Friday September 21st 2018: The UK’s fledgling smart home market has been given an unprecedented boost with the launch of Wondrwall, the world’s first intelligent home system that converts standard homes into intelligent homes.

At the core of Wondrwall’s pioneering technology are its advanced light switches.

Replacing the standard light switches in the home, each unit contains 13 different sensors that monitor temperature, humidity, power, motion, luminosity and sound to create an unrivalled network of over 100 sensors throughout a typical three-bedroom home.

Using machine learning and predictive modelling to learn occupants’ habits and preferences, Wondrwall analyses how a home is used and automatically makes real-time adjustments to its heating, lighting and security.

“Our vision of an intelligent home is to give it a brain and the ability to control itself,” said Daniel Burton, founder & CEO of Wondrwall. “We’ve never found the idea of having to go to your phone to control isolated parts of your home – for example heating and lighting – to be particularly intelligent.”

“Instead we created a system that independently controls all aspects of the home based on how the people inside it live and behave as well how the home itself performs.”

“The power of our AI technology lies in our unique dataset with over 100 sensors in every home generating huge amounts of data about habitational patterns and how the home performs and our state-of- the-art machine learning algorithms. No other system embeds the equivalent number of sensors in to homes and the level of data we capture is the first of its kind in the world.”

  • revolutionary advanced light switches convert standard homes to automated intelligent homes 
  • each smart switch contains 13 sensors to monitor & analyse room usage
  • replacing standard light switches results in a network of over 100 sensors throughout the home
  • AI uses data to automatically make intelligent heating, lighting & security decisions
  • Amazon Alexa in every switch, offering unrivalled voice controlthroughout a home
  • integration with Sonos allows users to control and use Sonos speakers in their home

How Wondrwall works:

The Wondrwall smart switches collect data on how a room is used and employ cloud-based machine learning and predictive modelling to determine optimal energy usage.

Amazon’s Alexa voice technology is fully integrated into each switch, granting access to Alexa throughout a home. Users can instantly control the running of their home (e.g. heating, lighting, and security) by speech as well as accessing a range of services such as their work diary, traffic and weather reports – and even ordering a taxi or a pizza.

Wondrwall also works with and controls smart devices from other vendors via Alexa.

Users can play music out of every light switch. For superior sound quality, Wondrwall is integrated with Sonos and can control and use Sonos speakers in a home.

Besides the light switches, the Wondrwall system also includes a thermostat (to control the boiler), a siren (replacing existing security alarms and supplementing other devices such as smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors) and a key fob (to arm and disarm).

Wondrwall’s key benefits:

(1) Cost saving:
Wondrwall’s intelligence enables it to make real-time adjustments to your usual routines,
saving you the cost of heating and lighting an empty home. It learns how long it takes to warm different parts of a home at different times of the day to your ideal temperature. By identifying temperature preferences from past behaviour, it can wake you at your preferred temperature while minimising energy usage.
It also makes real-time adjustments based on your usual routines. If for example you’re running late, the heating will automatically pause until you are nearer home.
It also knows which rooms you are in and uses the temperature sensor of that room to avoid unnecessarily heating unoccupied rooms in the home.
(2) Security & safety:
Wondrwall adds a layer of intelligence to the standard safety features of a home.
With motion sensors throughout the home, intruders can be detected wherever they may be, in which case the home’s alarm system will activate.
If a home is empty and the sound of breaking glass is detected, the alarm activates, internal and external lights flash and an alert message is sent to the owner.
Individual motion sensors can be disabled to allow for large pets.
Wondrwall recognises when a home is unoccupied and turns lights off. When operating in ‘away’ mode, it can turn selected lights on and off to simulate occupancy.
Wondrwall recognises the sound of the fire or carbon monoxide alarm and automatic

ally flashes the lights and sounds an alert in every room to make sure everyone is safe.
In case of emergency, each fob has a built-in panic button – a single press sends an alert to all pre-programmed contacts simultaneously.

How the Wondrwall light switches work:
No other system embeds the equivalent number of sensors into homes – each light switch is mains connected and uses ZigBee technology, allowing the system to operate independently of Wi-Fi.
The switches also have Wi-Fi in-built, connecting them to the cloud and the machine learning and predictive modelling platform. Wi-Fi is also used to connect to Amazon’s Alexa system for voice control and use of other Amazon Alexa-connected devices.

Manual control:
The iOS and Android mobile apps give full control to the Wondrwall system, allowing the functions to be manually over-ridden at any time. The system can also be controlled via voice.

The cost of installing the Wondrwall system into a typical three-bedroom house is now £1,332 – similar to a burglar alarm.

“Britain has caught the smart home ‘bug’ and shoppers here are more likely to buy voice control devices than other European consumers,” said Daniel Burton. “This passion for joined up and integrated technology makes sense on many levels.”

“Along with making a home safer and more secure, Wondrwall also saves money. Ind

ependent research has shown that automated intelligent homes are 30 percent cheaper to run – savings that Google is also enjoying after it began using AI in an identical way to better cool its data centres.”

For additional information please contact:

Kevin Maxwell
Maxwell Comms Ltd
(e) kevin@maxwellcomms.com
(m) 07985 351 797

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

Smart home market figures:

  • the UK is the second most mature market in Europe, with 9% of homes controlled remotely.
  • over the last year the number of UK homes with smart speakers has doubled to 10%
  • record numbers of people are planning to buy smart home products, with UK consumers more likely to choose devices with voice control than other Europeans.
  • the UK market is forecast to grow by nearly 75% over the next two years to $6.94bn – globally it’s predicted to be worth $150bn by 2020.
  • over a quarter of British home buyers prefer homes equipped with smart home technology and are willing to pay an additional £3,000 for a suitably equipped home.
  • Wondrwall can be installed at any point in the build cycle, even as a retrofit to existing properties.
  • a typical three-bedroom house installation would involve eight Wondrwall switches, one siren, one thermostat and two fobs at a cost of approximately £1,332 – around the same cost as a burglar alarm
  • preliminary research predicts Wondrwall will cut heating and lighting bills by 30%
About Wondrwall:

Wondrwall is an Intelligent Living pioneer, giving the home the intelligence to adapt to the needs and desires of the occupants – automatically controlling heating, lighting, security and safety, with voice control technology to override any adjustments at any time.

At the heart of Wondrwall is a focus on energy efficiency and creating more sustainable homes for the future. Learning technology allows for powerful automation of a home’s energy, ensuring that homes are never lit and heated unnecessarily.
Founded in Manchester in 2014, Wondrwall is leading the UK’s intelligent home revolution. Supported by some of the largest technology companies in the world, like Amazon, Tech Data and Flex, Wondrwall is on a mission to change the way people interact with their home.

For more information, visit www.wondrwall.co.uk