VenbaTech: Not Just Home Automation but Life Management
The concept of automated homes has slowly evolved from pressing buttons to opening a door and being able to remotely observe and control the space. Chennai headquartered Venba Tech believes in open standards and continuous evolution of solutions. Venba Tech is an automation solution provider in commercial and home segments aiming towards simplicity, convenience and energy efficiency. More so, the company tries to lend the evolution perspective to its clients and customers; i.e. to look at automation not as way of bringing better control or improved functionality but taking care of economics too. Plainly put not just lifestyle but actually life management.When VenbaTech took off five years ago, the customers had to be educated about the definitions of home automation and its benefits in their day to day lifestyle in terms of comfort, security, safety and staying in touch with their homes from outside. There existed a general fear with respect to its feasibility.“We are thankful to some of our angel customers who gave us the opportunity to prove our solution. We are proud to say that all of our installations have been working with zero down time”,comments Bhanumathy Venkat,Founder & MD, Venba Tech.
Venba Tech strategizes to enable customers comprehend the several layers of benefits associated with home automation. Sure, security for homes is agross need, but beyond this layer,comfort of automation is an obvious making a lifestyle statement. Venba Tech takes a step further and introduces‘life management’. Bhanumathy explains the term as how one has to necessarily rearrange a home’s processes and systems(it is not only for office) aided by automation for the dynamic life every individual leads today.
With the evolution of LED lighting and the need for energy conservation,the company designs new measures to bring about mood lighting, scheduled usage,tuned home in conjunction with external environmental conditions, consumption monitoring,integration of solar power, automation of all utilities. Venba Tech works with different protocols that are open such as KNX,Modbus, Bacnet,TCP/IP, DALI for lighting, Zwave for wireless and IOT with integrations into smart phones,Amazon echo and Google Assistant.“The openness in our solution keeps the investment secure for our customers and is almost service free”,adds Bhanumathy.
The Obvious Critical Factor
The company provides security that is devoid of false alarms. Venba Tech’s home security systems work 24X7 and alert the owner irrespective of his/her location. Security should not be seen as a post mortem tool. There are a number of various sensors that are available to alert in case of an incident. However,a good design with multiple layers of security would send alerts before an incident occurs with appropriate alert message and measures to the end users to scare the intruder away even before a breach is attempted.Venba Tech works with PIMA, one of Israel’s best-in-class security solution providers. The company integrates security tightly into home automation and gives it the top most priority for timely notifications.
Educating to Choose the RightSolution
Smart home market is stuck in the'chasm'of the technology adoption curve, in which it is struggling to surpass the early adopter phase and move to the mass market phase of adoption. VenbaTech has been motivating more businesses and home owners to steer towards home automation.
Technology is shifting from a full grown solution with complete planning happening from the building inception stage to recent“Do it your self” phase that is gearing towards mass market. There are large homes with various lifestyle features that need extensive planning and a robust design to bring all the features together. Evidently, this requires a well chalked blueprint while implementation is the key. Venba Tech works closely with customers and architects to provide the total home automation in these large home projects. The technologies it adopts are mostly hybrid that supports both wired and wireless. Even though the company is beyond the early adoption phase, it still believes the clients need education on home automation.“It works for us that we help the clients chose the right solution for them from their own instruction rather than thrust what we believe works for them”, adds Bhanumathy. Never the less, mass market is generally volume and are packaged attractive to lure the customers. VenbaTech too carries packages with wireless sensors that are easy to retrofit. As for developers who prefer to offer their apartment owners home automation solution,these packages suits the requirement.
Interoperability and Safety
Currently,there are many networks,standards, and devices being
used to connect the smart home,creating interoperability problems and making it confusing for the consumer to set up and control multiple devices. Being a stabilized, proven,and tested home automation solution provider, Venba Tech works only on interoperable open protocols. The company clears confusions and at the same time has the expert skill set to work and integrate various technologies and protocols while continuously testing and investing heavily on in house research and development.
Most of the innovations that happen today are done with interoperability in mind. Even manufacturers understand that if their device is proprietary,losing the market share in short span is concern. Product life cycle will sustain and be future proof only when it is adaptable to evolving technologies. Moreover, for a solution to sustain the long term course it requires to be tested and proven. Not failing to mention, the Indian conditions are quite challenging from the clean power prospective. Therefore,Venba Tech uses devices that sustain the various power conditions and provides stable operation 24x7 with promising years to come.“We built enough safety features in our controls such as over voltage protection,short circuit protection and earth leakage protection”,adds Bhanumathy. This creates homes that are electrically safe haven. Most importantly, the company educates the customers on why home automation is much more electrically safer to adopt with a clear separation between high and low voltages within the home. Bhanumathy exclaims that buildings do have a biology and home automation helps maintain healthy building biology.
Unfortunately, in India, challenges related to Internet connectivity, Internet connection reliability and availability of required connection bandwidth have not been completely eradicated. Smart homes are smart only when one can access and monitor homes from remote locations. When the user is away from home, his/her primary concern is always security and safety of the loved ones back at home.Hence bottlenecks associated with connectivity poses a direct obstacle to security. Venba Tech’s designs are based on notification on exception basis. The solutions offered by Venba Tech put security or safety breach at top priority, and alert the user away from home. This alert arrives to the user either through a GSM chip, and/or via a more reliable land line and/or through network. The notification provides all the relevant information for the home owner to act. The owner then monitors the home through cameras and automation applications either through a smart phone or desktop.
“Yes.The reliability of Internet is a question even though we are progressing rapidly as there is less worry,when compared to 5 years ago”,assures Bhanumathy.
Aligning with the Indian Mindset A Priority
Indians consumers with respect to any technology are very selective in terms of investment on convenience and technology. This automation provider educates customers on all aspects of technology and shows them tangible benefits. Majority of the company’s home automation devices are designed with open standards in mind and VenbaTech has been playing a vital role with manufacturers in tuning the devices to Indian standards to handle the power variations.“Our devices are installed in hundreds of homes today and are performing without downtime”,says Bhanumathy.
Venba Tech has automation packages for builders starting INR 99,999 with lighting automation,dimming, scenes,air-conditioning control monitoring for social areas and master bedroom with gas leak sensors and main door alarm. The company also avails an exclusive security package for INR 29,999 with main door alarm, gas leak alarm, panic buttons and notification devices with GSM alerts and remote using smart phones.
The buzz about IoT enabled homes and smart homes are spreading like wildfire. The future revolves around smart grids,which eventually calls for homes to get smart and work with smart grids. Correspondingly, Venba Tech has plans underway to develop IoT gateways that can talk to IoT enabled devices and create inter operability between IoT homes and IoT enabled city or smart grids. Venba Tech will soon be adopting the latest lighting controls on DALI giving flexibility to the end users to have the desired zoning, constant level light control, change LED temperature,color based on the scene settings and know the status of each light fitting. The company shows intentions to move towards switch less homes for controls. As far as the ‘Make In India theme is concerned, VenbaTech is going all in to devise IoT sensors to turn homes smarter and respondent to the Hub.
All said, Venba views the present automation trends as the precursor to a full blown IoT revolution a few years down the line and promises to keep that perspective as it works and evolves in this space.
VenbaTech has been playing a vital role with manufacturers in tuning the devices to Indian standards to handle the power variations
Most of the innovations that happen today are done with interoperability in mind. Even manufacturers understand that if their device is proprietary,losing the market share in short span is concern. Product life cycle will sustain and be future proof only when it is adaptable to evolving technologies. Moreover, for a solution to sustain the long term course it requires to be tested and proven. Not failing to mention, the Indian conditions are quite challenging from the clean power prospective. Therefore,Venba Tech uses devices that sustain the various power conditions and provides stable operation 24x7 with promising years to come.“We built enough safety features in our controls such as over voltage protection,short circuit protection and earth leakage protection”,adds Bhanumathy. This creates homes that are electrically safe haven. Most importantly, the company educates the customers on why home automation is much more electrically safer to adopt with a clear separation between high and low voltages within the home. Bhanumathy exclaims that buildings do have a biology and home automation helps maintain healthy building biology.
Unfortunately, in India, challenges related to Internet connectivity, Internet connection reliability and availability of required connection bandwidth have not been completely eradicated. Smart homes are smart only when one can access and monitor homes from remote locations. When the user is away from home, his/her primary concern is always security and safety of the loved ones back at home.Hence bottlenecks associated with connectivity poses a direct obstacle to security. Venba Tech’s designs are based on notification on exception basis. The solutions offered by Venba Tech put security or safety breach at top priority, and alert the user away from home. This alert arrives to the user either through a GSM chip, and/or via a more reliable land line and/or through network. The notification provides all the relevant information for the home owner to act. The owner then monitors the home through cameras and automation applications either through a smart phone or desktop.
“Yes.The reliability of Internet is a question even though we are progressing rapidly as there is less worry,when compared to 5 years ago”,assures Bhanumathy.
Aligning with the Indian Mindset A Priority
Indians consumers with respect to any technology are very selective in terms of investment on convenience and technology. This automation provider educates customers on all aspects of technology and shows them tangible benefits. Majority of the company’s home automation devices are designed with open standards in mind and VenbaTech has been playing a vital role with manufacturers in tuning the devices to Indian standards to handle the power variations.“Our devices are installed in hundreds of homes today and are performing without downtime”,says Bhanumathy.
Venba Tech has automation packages for builders starting INR 99,999 with lighting automation,dimming, scenes,air-conditioning control monitoring for social areas and master bedroom with gas leak sensors and main door alarm. The company also avails an exclusive security package for INR 29,999 with main door alarm, gas leak alarm, panic buttons and notification devices with GSM alerts and remote using smart phones.
The buzz about IoT enabled homes and smart homes are spreading like wildfire. The future revolves around smart grids,which eventually calls for homes to get smart and work with smart grids. Correspondingly, Venba Tech has plans underway to develop IoT gateways that can talk to IoT enabled devices and create inter operability between IoT homes and IoT enabled city or smart grids. Venba Tech will soon be adopting the latest lighting controls on DALI giving flexibility to the end users to have the desired zoning, constant level light control, change LED temperature,color based on the scene settings and know the status of each light fitting. The company shows intentions to move towards switch less homes for controls. As far as the ‘Make In India theme is concerned, VenbaTech is going all in to devise IoT sensors to turn homes smarter and respondent to the Hub.
All said, Venba views the present automation trends as the precursor to a full blown IoT revolution a few years down the line and promises to keep that perspective as it works and evolves in this space.
