New Web presence

The New CIS Web site is very fresh and does inspire some confidence in the future.

Now lets deal with the lack of confidence consumers have that they will ever enter the world of "Home Automation"

To quote a researcher presenting to the Technology conference in Queensland;

"The home automation guys are not getting critical mass. We are currently doing a research study for a major home automation brand and even their own customers are not happy with what they are offering".

Far be it for me to revisit the posting about "critical mass" and 'loss leader, entry level packaging of say a relay and 12 basic switches...... oops

 

** yawn **

 

Maybe you should find a more credible source Phoneman!

CEDIA Market Is Not Stuffed. IDC

David Richards - Tuesday, 28 February 2006

COMMENT: CEDIA has called a board meeting to discuss the comments made by researcher Graeme Philipson at this week's KickStart Conference on the Queensland Sunshine coast.

The controversy blew up after Philipson criticised the home automation industry describing it as being "in a mess". It is now revealed that Philipson's Company Connected Research Services is a 50/50 joint venture between Melbourne based publisher Jeff Patchell of Connection Magazines for the past 18 months has been spruiking Philipson's research without revealing that he is a share holder as opposed to a sponsor of the research.

This is not the 1st time that Philipson has found himself in hot water relating to his association with Connected Research Services several months ago he was dumped by Fairfax as a writer and journalist for not revealing his association with Connected Research Services when writing an article on the digital home.

 

Sounds familiar

 

But the CIS Website is still fresh

I think so anyhow.

 

A yawn and "squeak" are both sounds, you are requested not to make either sound.

 

Entry level package revisited again

How about you forget the relay, buy 12 x 2031VA's and Ill send you a special wiring diagram on how to install them !!!!!!!! You will be miles ahead.

 

Stephen! Behave...

Or should that be - "Oh behaaave"

 

Come in Spinner

BSS, your response not only exemplifies the point I am trying to make but you have also cut the lunch of every CBUS integrator and sounded the death knell for CBUS in your reply.

If you, as a member of this forum can't even introduce CBUS at a cost effective switch on-switch off level, what hope do the great unwashed have?

I am sure Clipsal would have preferred to see a considered response from one of their alleged "true believers" that doesn't try sell the customer something that they can buy in a hundred different brands and iterations and more importantly opens a window to the future.

Furthermore, your 'sales pitch' has ensured that the customer will almost NEVER upgrade his system to CBUS and the best hope you have for an upgrade is to a 2032E450T (or a XL420E come to think of it!), hope he's paying cash for your labour on the upgrade so you can buy a hamburger on the way home.

Glad you don't work for me, I am kinda partial to steak and lots of it!

 

I am unsure if it's a good idea to even grace this thread with a response, but... all I can say is that perhaps there IS an opportunity for a lower-priced Lighting Control system, although the use of Cbus (as it is right now) is probably not the answer.

Consider that an "entry-level" system will never have the feature-set of a properly designed one, and furthermore that a major cost of any installation is the Intergrator's services... the initial briefings, designing of both the control system and the associated wiring, then the implimentation and programming of the system, and finally the documentation and ongoing maintainence / variation of the system to suit the client's changing requirements. This takes time, and time is money.

But good design is what control systems are all about ! It's to provide a system that matches the cleint's present and future requirements, at a price they are willing to pay. If they don't want Distributed Audio (because they've never had it and therefore see no need for it), then there is no way they will pay for design and cabling for it to be installed in the future. I know people who didn't see the need for a dishwasher, so their kitchen is built without facility to install one...

An entry-level system cannot provide any of that stuff I just mentioned... a bare-bones "switch and relay" system offers absolutely NO advantage to the end-user at all (compared to conventional wiring, as BSS implied). So, even if it was only AU$500 for a 12-pack of relay, PCint and C2000 switches, to ensure a decent result the client would still need to spend the money on the integrator's time to design the system & wiring in such a way that it actually COULD be expanded !

The big difference between a basic entry-level system and a great system (or at least a an expandable system) is ALL about the Integrator's services, rather than the hardware. When faced with budget constraints, we still have to charge for the time to design the end-result system and then ensure that cables, etc are installed to meet furture expansion, don't we? And every single project has budget constaints - I have yet to work on or even see a project where the client didn't want to strip features to reduce the cost.

Cbus Toolkit is hard enough for experienced people to use, and is totally unsuitable as a "retail end-user" product. And anyway, if the client could purchase a complete kit and install it themselves, then there'd be no role for the Integrator. Further, the Integrator provides the valuable service of defining what is required, and how to wire and impliment it - without the services of the Integrator the resultant installation could be almost guaranteed to be done in a non-upgradable way.

When I get briefs for Cbus, it is definitely NOT for switching only. Clients request dimmers at the very least, and are excited or expecting the poosibility of schedules, scenes and other "fancy stuff". And MOST of my projects require switch plates that look cool - there is no way they'd accept Neo let alone 2000 series plates! That is what they expect from a control system - it has to look and operate differently to standard wiring or there's absolutely no point installing it. All that necessitates at least Dimmer Modules, a Ctouch or PAC and Saturn Ulti or Reflections switches.

Clients who do not understand the concept of Control have no need for Cbus, so even if the Hardware was FREE and all they had to pay for was Integration labour... they simply wouldn't pay it. If price is an issue, they are probably buying a project home and the builder has a pre-configured wiring system. Don't underestimate the horrendous cost of variations in a project home - my sister was quoted $25,000 extra to change the standard-issue concrete tile roof to colourbond (a cheaper material, and requiring cheaper roof trusses). It costs about $60 each to add extra powerpoints to a project home - Imagine the cost of changing from conventional to Cbus wiring!

I am not suggesting that there is no place for a entry-level system. But the problem is that an Integrator is still required to design and install it. If that is done properly, then a basic system can be expanded easily. Removing the need for an Integrator, and offering basic control systems that can't really control anything is not the answer. What will move Home Automation forward is decent education of the clients, and improving the selling skills of the people (integrators) who make a living from meeting the client's expectations of such systems.

Cheers, John

 

Thanks for your sermon Brother John

You must have attended the Phil H school of diplomacy



Totally agree with your comments.


P.S. Those typing courses you have undertaken have really come in handy...

 

LOL - maybe I should apply for a job in the CIS Marketing Dept

 

Case in point!

JohnC

Rather than a typing course you might have considered Marketing 101.

Try looking at Wikipedia for "Market Penetration". Maybe you could Google ?Loss Leader? or read how Hyundai got going in Australia. The Hyundai Excel was a loss generator for the company for 5 years. Now it more than pays its way because the brand is well known and accepted, oh and they have many other models, options and upgrade streams to offer now they are an established brand. Kia on the other hand?

A lot of participants here seem too close to their product and their current charge out rates and show little appreciation for future earnings and sources of revenue.

I don?t think CBUS is a cheap product, nor should it be. I simply believe that at its most basic level (ie. Hyundai excel) CIS should develop a strategy that facilitates the ?introduction? of this product to the market in a manner that provides a future upgrade stream and in turn locks out their competitors.

For the doubters that choose to flame my thoughts, you may not fully appreciate that the 2031VA?s actually use a completely different Topology to the CBUS System you some vehemently yet naively support.

Anyone with a minutiae of construction and business savvy would know that most of the 150,000 new residential constructions commenced last year were initially offered as a basic package and that the money was made by the builder in the ?upgrade? or extras. How many had CBUS I wonder? Ubiquity would no doubt be delusional but wouldn?t Schneider?s like the concept.

Now if we as a community and Clipsal as a manufacturer found a way to get say 20 percent of new home starts to use the CBUS Topography from the outset, the future would be very bright for all concerned.

JohnC, you somewhat emphatically said;

? bare-bones "switch and relay" system offers absolutely NO advantage to the end-user at all?

I guess YOU weren?t listening when they ran the lectures on introduction to CBUS! I think I heard them mention a few advantages.

I guess I will simply have to wait for the penny to drop before I can include CBUS at even its most basic level in my housing designs.

In order to try to add some credibility to my point, I have made several million dollars (and lost a hell of a lot too) taking what were expensive niche items to the consumer market.

Anyone want flame me I am sure the forum participants would prefer that you PM me and take it offline. I do hope that it gets through to Marketing because I too am passionate about this product and believe it has the potential to get there but only if marketed appropriately.

Lets face it the inroads have not been that great since it was introduced in 1994!

 

Hi Phoneman,

You will definitely not get any flaming from me, and I apologise if anyone thought that was my intention. My reason for posting was to discuss the difficulty I have with the whole concept of "entry-level" Cbus because the majority of real cost in a Cbus installation is NOT the hardware, but in the proper design and implimentation of the system. So, it's LABOUR that is the main cost, not the equipment.

I agree with the concept of moving Home Automation out of the "elite" market and more towards mainstream (even if only an additional 5% of houses). The question is simply : HOW can we acheive that?

There is nothing stopping any of us here from offering Cbus in basic housing designs. I work for a lighting company that specialises in mid to high-end domestic installations. We speak to clients all the time about control systems, and install and integrate quite a lot of them.

However, as with all "add-ons", if the client cannot see the value of the installation... they simply won't pay the money. People who are building a new house have inevitably "over-stretched" themselves already, so up-selling is very very hard when they are already over budget. And a control system that is severely compromised does not show added value, irrespective of how "expandable" it is.

I don't have any problem selling a decent, well designed and implimented Cbus system to a client who appreciates the concept - if fact we have far too many jobs on the books so we are turning them away! But these are the types of clients we (as Integrators) tend to focus on for a very good reason. Spending valuable time trying to sell something to someone who doesn't want it, or wants it but simply cannot afford it... well, that would definitely increase our labour rates considerably.

Let me use an analogy that I mentioned before. Many many people don't have dishwashers (actually, I can't believe how many)... and let's agree that a dishwasher is NOT an expensive item, you can buy a decent one for $800 and I have no problem justifying to myself and everyone else why I spent over $2K on my Asko. But a lot of people can't see the value in ANY dishwasher... they believe that the results are poor, or say that they "like washing dishes".

So, how can I (as a dishwasher salesperson) sell them a dishwasher? Firstly, the client can't see any value in even having a dishwasher, so they don't "need one". So that is the first objection to overcome, and a hard one at that. Ok, let's try to convince them to at least allow a space to fit a dishwasher into their kitchen, to allow for the future or perhaps at resale time - but they don't want to because they need the cupboard space. And anyway, they don't want a dishwasher, so why bother?

Let's say I win those battles and then after hours of work I sell them a "entry-level, cut-down" dishwasher for $500 that HALF-washes the dishes... it doesn't do everything that a decent dishwasher can do, but it's an entry point into the world of dishwasher ownership. Well, the client then uses it and finds out that it really isn't something special, in fact it reinforces their view that dishwashers are a useless waste of money! And they go and tell everyone that (brand) dishwasher is absolute crap!

A lot of the problem for the dishwasher salesperson above is that whilst they made the sale, they didn't provide a satisfactory outcome for the client. In many ways they damaged the reputation of themselves and their supplier, because the product did not add value to the client's life. Yet, it's even sadder because for an extra few hundred $ they could have had a dishwasher that did the job properly...

Back to Cbus - I don't see how the offering of lower-priced Cbus modules will help the cause very much. There is nothing currently stopping us (as integrators) selling basic systems, and the older 2000 series (and similarly priced but nice looking SL and SC) switches are perfect for that. These could be sold under the present pricing structure for (say) $60 each which is very reasonable. Would a price drop to $30 per switch make any difference at all to make or break the sale?

OK - perhaps it would, but what about the integration costs? These are the "fixed costs", there's no way of reducing that labour is there? And what about the Cat5 cable? And the Enclosures that house the Cbus modules, and all that extra cabling because of the perverse practice of putting all the Cbus in one central location? And what about the extra costs for "smart" electricians who can be trusted to wire up the house properly?

So, all I am trying to say is that it is for CIS to market the product and provide market awareness - the client's "desire to buy". But it is the role of the Integrators to provide installations that showcase the advantages of Control Systems, so that the client tells their friend how GREAT the system is, and they tell their friend, etc etc. Remember that old Sales and Marketing saying that 1 dissatisfied customer tells 10 other people... and that not all publicity is good publicity.

In finishing (too much typed already on this) - I consider that we Integrators and Installers need to start offering really good projects, and basically walk away when price starts to become the main driver. I am sure most of us have spent hours fixing up "botched" Cbus installs because the client has screwed the original Integrator on price, and they have ended up with a less that decent solution.

I probably come at the subject from a completely different viewpoint to many others (too much work already, and an existing high-end client base) - our company simply cannot AFFORD to sell to property developers and spec-home builders. We connot survive in business by cutting prices, because our whole business model is based upon providing the best solution not the cheapest one. Dropping down into that market would expose us to far, far too many competitors who can always "do it cheaper"...

No more from me on this - Cheers, JC