Greg Biehl could talk all day about the virtues of home automation, the wonders and ease of natural voice processing technology (Alexa’s smarter sibling) and the value of integrating all your home’s controls from an easy-to-use app.
He could share testimonials from satisfied clients who were once skeptical about home automation and now couldn’t live without it. And that learning integration was as easy as Greg and his team at Innovative Lifestyles LLC promised.
But, Greg would rather talk about the smiles.
“We installed a 12-seat home theater with a 130” screen and when their daughter had a sleepover birthday party, screening Frozen II for her friends, the little girls were wide-eyed, grinning ear to ear. That’s all we want, those smiles,” says Greg, COO at Innovative Lifestyles in Naples.
Innovative Lifestyles LLC is a full-service residential custom electronics and design integration company offering home or business systems that are safe, elegant, fun and easy to use.
Over the last year, Innovative has helped clients manage pandemic pivots that home automation offers, making schooling, working remotely, and security easier. “We retrofitted video conferencing in a home office to include complete home automation with our Crestron desktop system, making running a home, family and business completely integrated,” says Greg. He’s talking about The Crestron® UC-MM30-R tabletop conference device that pairs an enterprise-grade speakerphone with the powerful control of the Crestron Home™ operating system to provide one convenient home office companion.
“We are seeing more people working from home and now they can control lighting, heating and cooling, audio, tv, lighting, blinds, the pool and security from a desktop system,” says Greg. “We’ve also worked with homeowners who already have home automation who want to layer on more platforms.”
Customers value the ease of use along with the opportunity to control what’s happening inside their four walls.
When exploring home automation solutions and opportunities with a homeowner, project managers will oversee design, handle technology choices, design considerations and the latest engineering available to meet the client’s budget and needs. The relationship continues through training. “One customer was very hesitant about his ability to use the automation technology in his newly built home and after thorough training, he called us the next day to say, ‘You’re right I got it!’”
Next up, Greg is excited about the turns in voice control technology. Like Siri or Google Now, the Josh programming language is built to support natural language voice commands. The folks at Josh explain this includes greetings, questions, instructions, and more. Further, Josh is built to control and connect any “smart” device, from any device. For example, with Josh you can turn on your speakers from your watch, change the temperature from your phone, and shut off the lights from your desktop.
“My six-year-old daughter can ask Josh to turn on the lights in the family room, turn off the ceiling fan, and it’s done. The advances in this technology is astounding and we’re very excited about sharing this with our clients.”
He explains that technology turns happen every 3-5 years. “We watch that like a hawk. There are so many layering and upgrades.” He says Innovative’s team managers continue their professional development and training remotely plus learn at an annual trade show and attend user interface training regularly.
The cost of the magic? For comfortably under $10,000, he can design and automate 12 zones of lights, a security system, audio, video and a couple of HVAC zones. All the magic, in the palm of your hand.
6210 Shirley Street, Suite 104, Naples
239.591.4673