As SK Telecom, South Korea’s largest cellular provider, rolls out its new digital smart home service, Boston’s Ember Corp. will play and integral role. The service will include Ember’s ZigBee wireless networking technology to monitor and control the sensor networks that will drive the service.
As part of the smart home service, customers would be able to monitor and control a variety of functions inside their homes remotely using cell phones, and the Internet, through SK Telecom’s service offerings.
The first phase of the digital home service rollout will offer a range of Ember-enabled wireless devices, sensors and services to monitor and control appliances, lights, smoke detectors, intrusion detectors, climate controls, gas valves and electronic door locks, all linked to the Internet wirelessly via a ZigBee-based residential gateway.
SK Telecom’s service, which is being tested inside 400 Korean households, is part of an extensive government digital home initiative aimed at connecting approximately 4 million households through home networking systems by 2007. Commercial availability of the service is slated for the fourth quarter of 2005 in Korea, with plans to make the technology available globally through licensing agreements with telecommunications providers in other regions.
Ember develops ZigBee-compliant wireless semiconductor products designed to meet demand to automate homes, reduce energy consumption in dwellings, reduce breakdown rates in manufacturing plants, and help monitor the country’s borders, according to company officials.
