And now… smart perfume
Ninu Perfume has combined AI with fragrances. Using a mobile app, you can inform your smart perfume about your day and about how you are feeling, and it “custom blends” a unique fragrance of the day, right in the applicator. The app’s digital assistant, Pierre, helps mix the occasion-specific fragrance and informs you when you are running low and need to reorder. Ninu is made from premium, eco-friendly ingredients and housed in a well-designed case. Input
dis-rup-shun: This is the ultimate internet of things play, as we had breakfast cereal boxes and toasters in the queue for receiving smarts well ahead of perfume bottles, but let this stand as a great symbol for the vastness of this category includes. Making simple pleasures of life more personal and “custom” have merit, as most people want a personal touch, and when we start going out of the house again, this will be a conversation item.
Samsung Bot Handy robot
Samsung showed off, at CES, a one-armed mobile robot that is able to pick up objects, using cameras and intelligence to apply the right force at the right time. The demonstration showed the robot moving dishes from the sink to the dishwasher, pouring a glass of wine, and placing a single flower stem into a small vase. While this device is not likely to reach market in its current state, Samsung is displaying some impressive capabilities which will find their way to market over countless, and likely bumpy attempts to make robots main stream home products. CNET
dis-rup-shun: Specialized robots, such as robotic vacuums, do work and are selling well, but a multi-purpose butler is a long way off. Home tasks can be done very quickly and affordably by efficient-minded homeowners or fair-priced domestic workers. Watching a bulky and expensive robot slowly perform single tasks at low speeds has no place in busy households of multi-taskers. Expect household robots to be at least five years away from being popular items.
Alarm.com offers touchless doorbell
In the age of COVID, and with general heighten awareness about spreading infectious diseases, Alarm.com now offers a touchless smart doorbell. by simply standing in front of the device (or standing on an appropriately labeled doormat), the visitor can simply stand and wait to be spoken to. CNET
dis-rup-shun: Doorbell cameras are a great addition to the home, and will become the standard for any home in coming years, but there is room for improvement. First, if you have much activity in front of your house, motion sensing sets off alarms quite regularly, which can be too frequent. Secondly, the delay time from first ring to activation and engagement with the person outside often takes too long. As these deficiencies are addressed and facial recognition determines what and even who is there, then these products will become far more helpful.
Mobile home theater from Asus
The Asus Latte 1 is a home theater projector and Bluetooth speaker about the size of a large cup of coffee which projects images up to 120 inches in size at 700p. While the price is not yet known, the device offers an easy way to turn most any place into a home theater. Input
dis-rup-shun: Think of the places that you could turn into a movie-watching party: dorm rooms, campouts, hotel rooms, birthday parties, business presentations. If you can recall all of the occasions that you have hurried to a client site to give a presentation and the AV gear won’t cooperate, popping out your own projector to “just start” could be an impressive move. While this is a niche product category, it has potential of becoming a useful business or entertainment tool in coming days.