Could Motorized Shades Drive Home Automation?

Quick, which home technology gets you in the door with clients? Multiroom audio? Energy management? Universal remotes? Lighting control?

How about motorized shades?

Window coverings that rise and drop at the press of a button, and respond automatically to light and temperature sensors, will be the killer app for home control if Somfy has anything to do with it.

A world leader in motorization for window coverings (and projection screens and lifts and more), Somfy has developed a whole-house control system that makes motorized shades a “core part, not an accessory,” says Steve Iommi, business development manager for Somfy Systems Inc.

The system, called Tahoma, focuses on three key Z-Wave-enabled subsystems for energy management: lights, thermostats and motorized shades. CE Pro calls it the energy trifecta. Somfy calls it the energy triangle.

“A lot of companies are automating lights and thermostats, but they’re not managing the envelope,” says Iommi, referring to window coverings as the envelope of the home. “We’ve got the hardest part of this [ecosystem] mastered – window coverings. Adding lights and thermostats is the easy part.”

How Somfy Tahoma Works

To integrate Somfy motorized shades into a whole-house control system, the company developed a Z-Wave bridge to its own wireless protocol called RTS (Radio Technology Somfy).

“It was a beast” to develop, Iommi says.

On top of that, Somfy worked with select vendors of Z-Wave products to create the “energy triangle.”

For lights, Somfy is working with Cooper Wiring Devices (Aspire line), Leviton (Vizia RF) and Evolve, a newcomer in Z-Wave-based controls for the hospitality industry.

Z-Wave thermostats are based on technology from RCS Technology (formerly Residential Control Systems).

Somfy also is partnering with Intermatic for motion sensors. Although Intermatic called it quits on Z-Wave in 2009, they “still have a very significant interest in participating,” Iommi says.

In theory, all Z-wave devices should be interoperable, but in practice they might not be.

In Somfy’s case, Tahoma does not work with off-the-shelf Z-Wave devices, according to Iommi: “It’s not something where a DIY or homeowner can go online and install a typical Z-Wave device.”

He explains, “Through our strategic relationships, we have done a lot of behind-the-scenes optimization of Z-Wave between their devices and Tahoma. We’ve gone into the backbone of the technology and made little tweaks that allow us to provide better performance through the entire Tahoma system.”

Z-Wave devices, including Somfy’s motorized shades, communicate with a Z-Wave enabled Tahoma hub that plugs into the home network.

From there, the system communicates with Somfy’s remote server, which aggregates the data for delivery to browser-based devices and smart phones.

Even though the system requires access to Somfy’s server, the company is not charging a monthly fee for users – going against the business models established by ADT, Schlage, Verizon, Comcast and others.

“We had quite an arm wrestle over that,” Iommi says. “We thought that for the North American market we are all so fed up with fees that we had to structure an offering in a way that the homeowner can invest in a solution that will allow them to stay connected to the home from anywhere in the world … without having to be nickled-and-dimed through additional fees.”