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Two patents filed about twelve months back by Apple is a revealing piece as to where the Jobs et al see the home heading in the future.

The first patent covers the communications over the electricity wiring in the home (US Patent 20100007473 – Intelligent Power-Enabled Communications Port) while the second (US Patent 20100010857 – Intelligent Power Monitoring) covers power monitoring in the house of remote devices over said wiring.

With the recent launch of the iPad, in addition to a post by Ethan Kaplan (Vice President of Technology at Warner Bros Music) giving some perspective to the cost and capabilities of the iPad and somewhat similar devices in the home (Logitech Harmony, Phillips Pronto TSU9800, Phillips TSU9400), I began thinking about how Apple is position itself to be the platform for the house in a way that its nearest competitor Microsoft hasn’t got to yet.

Smart Home Infrastructure

I followed Ethan Kaplan’s adventure in home automation a few years back (artifacts are still visible on flickr) and found it to be very much a hack-together approach, regardless of the technology that was being used.

Apple’s guiding philosphy is (whether or not you agree with it): it just works. I believe that they see an opening in the market in the future for building on their platform to provide increased capabilities when it comes to first understanding, and then controlling, devices in the home.

HomePlug, a core part of their patent filings, is a technology that uses the existing wiring in your home as the network infrastructure allowing connectivity between devices without being dependent on a wireless technology. There are a number of reasons why HomePlug represents a significant benefit when moving towards the “internet of things”:

1. The wireless space, regardless of spectrum, is heading towards saturation
2. The connection to the network already exists (assuming of course you have fixed power to the device, or a network hub device)

The Missing API

Apple has already proven itself adept at pushing inovation in the web space, taking an opinion on the future of Adobe’s Flash product (with no Flash available on the iPhone OS). I believe that it has the best on the general population when it comes to providing easy interfaces to work with – there is no better example of this than the iPhone’s success over the past nearly three years.

As a result I believe that Apple is not interested too much in ownership over the devices that could work with it, but rather seeing the development and adoption of a standardised data transfer format in addition to control mechanisms. This is where the adoption of the HAN will be a critical first step – allowing both HomePlug and ZigBee to work together. Following this an API needs to be formed for allowing a higher degree of interdevice operations. When this finally arrives, the iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch and other devices in this space from Apple will definitely take on a bigger part of our life.

For the smart home of tomorrow, Apple has already deployed their “trojan horse” into the world.

The Competitors

While there exist some start ups in this space, and there exists legacy expensive niche products, there are two main groups that have real potential to compete with Apple on a scale that would worry them.

Microsoft

Apple’s closest competitor in this space would be Microsoft. Redmond does see a future in smart home management technologies with much of their focus to date focussed on building the XBOX as the centre of the home. Unfortunately no one factored in the arrival of the Nintendo Wii onto the seen, obliterating much of the sales and killing a core market that would be needed for wider success of this strategy.

In the area of “providing information on energy consumption” Microsoft has had their Hohm product in the marketplace for some time now, giving consumers in parts of the United States a level of feedback and visibility over their electricity usage that has not previously existed. At this stage it is not exactly in the Smart House space of the future, however it is a first step in getting people thinking about where a smart home could head.

Google

Google’s PowerMeter is much like Microsoft Hohm – an easy to use dashboard giving people feedback on their electricity consumption. To date I have not seen any plans to expand into a broader Smart Home space, however, as with Google, their Andriod operating system is a direct competitor to the iPhone OS and as such should not be underestimated as an alternative management tool in a future smart home.