Market Need
Many large buildings (over 150,000 sq. ft.) and some high-end (over $1m) luxury homes contain integrated automation systems that regulate their diverse working, living, and environmental conditions. The U.S. market for Commercial Building Automation Systems in large buildings is in excess of $6-billion per year. The U.S. market for Home Automation Systems in luxury residences exceeds $2-billion annually. 1
However, the majority of smaller commercial buildings (under 150,000 sq. ft.) and most homes – well over 90% of the available overall market – do not yet have such systems. Instead, they typically operate with manual electronic controls, grouped into small independent systems, that manage only one particular building element.
The most common examples include thermostats for air-conditioning, switching systems for lights, timers for sprinklers and pumps, and temperature controls on water heaters and electric space heaters. There are tens of millions of these independent control systems operating in buildings and homes, with millions more sold each year.
Each system operates differently than the others, and the controls of each are generally incompatible, using different control signals. Operators and users cannot effectively manage their buildings and homes to maximize efficiency, flexibility or to provide other benefits.
Broadband Energy's Uniplex platform is the first product available to mid-size commercial buildings or to residences that combines reasonable pricing, easy installation and setup, long term reliability, and broad compatibility across existing systems.
Building and Home Automation Goals:
- Empower Customers to monitor and control their use of energy and other essential services such as water, gas and secure access
- Enable customers to use and enjoy their living and working environments in new and compelling ways
- Increase user comfort, convenience, productivity and security, while saving time, energy and money
- Enhance the intelligence of the power grid - improve reliability and provide new capabilities and services
- Enable the power system to better meet customer needs, through increased ability to measure and manage load, and real-time communications with customers
- Increase revenues by improving efficiency and creating additional revenue-generating services
1 Continental Automated Buildings Assoc. Research Reports (www.caba.org)