Category: cloud

Episode 64: How a VC views the internet of things

Do you need money? Want to buy or sell an internet of things startup? Then this week’s interview is must-listen stuff. Matt Turck, of FirstMark Capital came on the show to give some advice to those seeking financing, discuss the overall funding landscape and try to pinpoint where the next big exits are going to come from. Why Turck? Because a few months ago he covered this who topic in amazing depth. So listen up to see what has changed!

Sproutling was one of the VC exits this year.
Sproutling was one of the VC exits this year.

Before you listen to Turck, Kevin shares his karaoke picks, we dig into the upcoming Bluetooth 5.0 specification and lay out what we think Apple’s HomeKit and Home app mean for the industry. We also talk about Samsung’s plan to invest $1.2 billion into the internet of things, its cloud, and Elon Musk’s offer to buy SolarCity. It’s not that crazy, y’all!

Host: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guest: Matt Turck of FirstMark Capital
Sponsor: WolfSSL

  • Kevin’s karaoke nightmare (also the latest on Bluetooth)
  • Apple’s Home app is somewhat demoralizing
  • What Samsung needs in IoT
  • We’re in the second wave of IoT exits
  • Don’t quit your day job to rush to build a new product

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Episode 59: Chipmakers love the smart car

This week I was at the NXP Technology Forum interviewing the semiconductor company’s CEO Rick Clemmer about smart cities and smart cars. The most interesting fact he shared was that the BMW Series 7 cars have about $300 worth of silicon inside them. To compare the estimates on the cost of chips inside the Apple iPhone 6 come to roughly $120.

The BMW Series 7 sedan packs a lot of silicon. --Image courtesy of BMW.
The BMW Series 7 sedan packs a lot of silicon. –Image courtesy of BMW.

Kevin was at Google IO this week, so next week’s episode should be full of great insights, so Janko Roettgers from Variety was my cohost. He has just been to CES Asia, so we learned about the Amazon Echo of china called Ding Dong and the size of CES Asia. We also discussed new integrations for the Nest, the Amazon IoT Dash button and a then I was kicked out of the room where I was recording. So we didn’t get a chance to cover Google Home and the sound quality isn’t as great because I was live with a wobbly connection. I hope you will bear with it.

Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Janko Roettgers
Guest: Rick Clemmer, CEO of NXP

  • So many more things work with Nest!
  • Tips on the AWS IoT button
  • Meet the Amazon Echo of China
  • How a chip company thinks about the internet of things
  • Cramming chips in cities and cars

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Episode 53: How to prevent good devices from being killed

This week’s show deals with recurring themes such as whether or not you should trust the cloud, device lifespan, the Amazon Alexa platform and more lighting than a Times Square billboard. Our guest this week is Mike Pessina, the co-CEO of Lutron. He shares his recipes for great lighting (at the very end) and talks about the role of Lutron’s proprietary wireless protocol for lighting control in a world that is rapidly embracing Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Before we learn about Lutron, Kevin Tofel and I discuss the news that Nest plans to shut down all Revolv smart home hub devices that are in the field, turning the $299 device into a hunk of metal and plastic scrap.

A Lutron Caseta dimmer switch (left) installed near the Osram Lightify wireless dimmer switch (right). A regular rocker switch is in the middle.
A Lutron Caseta dimmer switch (left) installed near the Osram Lightify wireless dimmer switch (right). A regular rocker switch is in the middle.

While Revolv sold fewer than 10,000 units, those who own one are upset. We came up with a few suggestions that might help other connected device companies avoid alienating their users in case of failure or a sale. On the brighter side, Amazon’s Alexa platform is gaining new smarts, with the Smart Home API now available to anyone. We also tell you how to control your TV with Alexa and review the Amazon Dot. This week you also get a second review, of the Osram Lightify dimmer switch, which renters and folks who aren’t keen on replacing their wired switches will like. And once again, we ask that you take our survey if you have a chance.

Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham
Guest: Michael Pessina, Co-CEO of Lutron

  • The Revolv fiasco is bad for the smart home.
  • Where did you put your Amazon Dot?
  • Get Alexa to turn on your TV with Yonomi.
  • Who should buy this $30 Osram dimmer switch?
  • What’s next for Lutron

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Episode 51: This CEO killed his hardware startup to start a wireless network

This week we have a two for one in the guest portion of the show, with Daniel Conrad, the CEO of Beep Networks explaining how he decided to stop making a connected device, take his VC funding and find a new business model. That’s part one. Part two is all about LoRa, the wireless radio technology used for low power wireless area networks, which is what his business is now built on. Conrad explains a classic entrepreneurial dilemma and then educates us all on up-and-coming networking technology that transmits small amounts of data over fairly long distances. Is this the perfect network for the Internet of things?

The Bernooli bottle top.
The Bernooli bottle top.

Before you get to Conrad, Michael Wolf is guest hosting in place of Kevin, and we discuss the lack of HomeKit news at the Apple event Monday, some cool connected bartending gear I saw at SXSW and Bosch’s new cloud for the internet of things. Bosch is spending $548 million on R&D in innovation tech, which is less than 1 percent of its annual revenue, but still nothing to sneeze at. For the gadget lovers, Mike and I discussed b8ta, the new retail concept for selling connected devices and tried to consider what Target’s secretive Project Goldfish is.

Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Mike Wolf of The Smart Home Show
Guests: Daniel Conrad of Beep Networks

  • What’s the right retail model for selling the smart home?
  • Make a drink with Bernooli
  • Killing the dream of a connected speaker
  • What is LoRa?
  • The best startup opportunity around.

 

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Episode 24: HomeKit surprise and no more passwords for the internet of things

Apple didn’t cover HomeKit in its massive event last week, but Kevin and spent a good chunk of time explaining what we we knew. Sadly, it’s not a lot, but it should be worth downloading iOS 9 and waiting a few more weeks. In enterprise news, we covered Salesforce’s IoT Cloud news, which will compete with IBM’s IoT foundation cloud. We also talked about a new access point from Samsung that adds Zigbee and Bluetooth to the mix before delving into a review of the OnHub router from Google. You’ll have to listen to the show and Kevin’s review to see if it’s worth the $199 price tag.

The OnHub router. Image courtesy of Tp Link.
The OnHub router. Image courtesy of TP Link.

After all of that, Paul Madsen, who works in the office of the CTO at Ping Identity, came onto the show to discuss the future of an identity layer for the Internet of things. This may sound esoteric, but it’s really important for all of us who hate having multiple passwords for every app on every device we have in the house, if you are one of those people, you may want to read more into these reviewed password managers. It also could help with guest authentication. The conversation gets a bit techie, but its worth it to understand how we may access our devices in the near future. He does threaten some kind of two-factor authentication for our smart home, guys. Enjoy.

Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guests: Paul Madsen of Ping Identity

  • HomeKit gets new tricks as part of iOS9 but where are the devices?
  • Comcast and AT&T are supporting new third-party devices.
  • Salesforce gets into the Internet of things and here’s why.
  • Does Kevin like the Google OnHub router?
  • Managing identity for smart home might look a lot like the web.
  • Are you ready for two-factor authentication in your home?

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Episode 23: Smart home breweries and Amazon’s konnected kitchen kabinets

I hope you’re hungry for some smart kitchen news because this week I have smart home analyst and the host of The Smart Home Show podcast Michael Wolf coming on to discuss Amazon’s plans for the kitchen and some really awesome technology he’s seeing in that room of the house. Wolf, who is hosting a conference on the topic Nov. 5 (you can register using the code IOTPOD and get 15% off the conference fee) wrote his take on the news that Amazon is building a connected device for the kitchen called Kabinet, that was leaked in a Wall Street Journal story. Wolf and I discuss what the Kabinet might entail as well as some other connected technologies he’s seen and how the smart kitchen will evolve. Some speculate that with the rise of electronics in the kitchen (with many looking for the best electric induction hob) so too will rise interconnectivity between them.

The Amazon Echo in my kitchen.
The Amazon Echo in my kitchen.

Before Wolf and I get started, Kevin Tofel and I share the latest on this week’s news with the Nest outage over Labor Day weekend, ARM and IBM’s partnership to bring the internet of things to more industrial users and introduce our own idea, which is that Google should buy web service If This Then That. The one thing you won’t find is Apple’s latest announcements because we recorded the show the day before Apple’s announcements. We just give you a reason to listen next week. In the meantime, please enjoy the show.

Host: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guest: Michael Wolf, The Smart Kitchen Summit

  • The Nest outage shows that once again, we shouldn’t rely on the cloud.
  • In which we find a buyer for IFTTT.
  • IBM and ARM team up for the industrial internet.
  • Inside Amazon’s plans for the smart kitchen.
  • Connected home brews, tea and other trends in connected cooking.

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Episode 4: The evolution of an IoT services business and build a connected garden

Spring is in the air, so this week’s podcast celebrates with a preview of an upcoming connected garden product that looks pretty smart — the Edyn sensor and connected water valve system that will hit Home Depot shelves in May and is available for pre-orders. Kevin I discuss the solar-powered sensors, and although it’s iOS-only for the time being, there’s reportedly an Android app coming some time in the future. We also talk about my plans for nighttime bathroom lighting, an awesome beta app that uses the Android lock-screen to control your connected devices in the home called Reach and more.

Michael Simon, CEO and Chairman of LogMeIn
Michael Simon, CEO and Chairman of LogMeIn

This week’s guest focuses on the business benefits of adding connectivity to your products with guest Michael Simon, the CEO and chairman of LogMeIn, the maker of the Xively service. Xively provides the back end infrastructure for connected devices, and recently launched an upgrade that offered better compliance and rules associated with devices and data. Simon focused on why that matters, what types of businesses can easily take advantage of connected products to offer higher value services and what the evolution of a connected business looks like. At the very end he dives into the architecture of the Xively platform, which boasts an “MQTT-compliant” messaging layer the Xively team built as well as off-the-shelf MySQL and Cassandra databases. I was hoping for something a little more like a knowledge graph given the relationships it would have to track, but apparently that’s not under the hood.

So, listen up for some inspiration on the home front or for your business, and feel free to let me know what you think.

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Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guests: Michael Simon, Chairman and CEO of LogMeIn

  • The Edyn garden sensor doesn’t feed you data, it feeds you information.
  • Using the Hue, SmartThings and a motion sensor for some nighttime bathroom lighting
  • Some sweet software for your Android lock screen from Reach
  • How to move from a connected product to a connected business
  • How do you architect a system to connect millions of endpoints. Simon can tell you.

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