“With years of experience in industrial automation, IoT devices, and electronics, a challenge that has always been close to our heart is about bringing automation and technology to our day to day lives.
I was always fascinated by the concept of smart homes, right from the time I first read about Bill Gates smart home in 2008. The technology then was very nascent and only accessible to a select few across the globe. (Fun
fact: Bill gates probably had the world’s first smart home, since 1995).
The technology got better over time, and the products became more affordable. I have been a consumer of smart home devices since 2013, and have been regularly indulging in the latest products to upgrade my home and office.
2 years back while working on an industrial automation project, I came across an interesting exigency. I had the opportunity to look at the current home, and office automation solutions, and I was surprised to see that
even though the technology behind these products had gotten significantly better, the industry hasn't progressed.
I was at an interesting crossroads. Because of my background and experience in industrial automation and IoT, I had the opportunity to change this. But was it worth it? What were the challenges I was going to face? Why
hadn’t other people been able to see and solve these challenges till now?
All of these questions made me more curious, and the seed of the next gen IOT company was born.
But before getting to execution, we decided to dive deep and not only understand the problems faced with the current solution, but also figure out the defiances in delivering these solutions.
With my brother, and co-founder, Lakshya we embarked on a journey, spanning over 5 months. We conducted extensive research about the industry, the end users and the competitors. We tried multiple products, applications and solutions.
Using latest Design thinking frameworks, we decided to conduct an extensive survey of 150+ homeowners with an annual household income greater than Rs. 15 Lac, 15 leading architects and designers, 5 Real Estate developers who have been
in the industry for over 20 years each, 15 entrepreneurs with office with a minimum size of 1000 square feet and 3 Hotel owners. The intention was to understand their problems first hand.
We identified a lot of challenges which include:
- poor product quality
- Not so intuitive applications
- Difficult in installing
- Cost challenges
We had expected most of these, but there were quite some revelations and insights too.
- Over 85% of home owners thought that making their home smarter required them to change all of their home appliances.
- The main reasons why architects didn’t recommend Smart home products and solutions to their customers was primarily because they were not satisfied with the quality of the products and service being provided.
- Hotel Owners were excited about the solution, as a smart hotel helps them bring down a lot of redundant expenses and monitor their facilities more conveniently, but they felt there was not an affordable and good enough solution
doing the same.
- The Real estate developers knew the big opportunity that smart homes were but were looking for a trustworthy partner to help them execute it, unlike a company just selling them products. They needed services and support too.
- All business owners showed great interest in the idea, but the cost involved and the thought of “having to shut down the operations for the renovation” made them reluctant to pursue the idea.
With all of these insights, we decided to get back to the drawing board and approach the problem from first principles.
We decided that the three key pillars of creating a company that successfully delivers great IoT solutions and makes people’s living spaces truly smart, and lives truly easier are:
- Good quality product at an affordable price.
- End to End service: Full service and
- A seamless experience with full modularity
Powered by these ideas and insights, and founded on these pillars we set out to create Lazy Nest, a company with the mission of delivering great IoT solutions, and experiences and a vision of creating smarter living experiences.
The Tldr version: We saw the way everyone was solving the problem, and selling the solution, and were not satisfied with it. So we decided to change the game, and LazyNest was born.“
Dhruv Jhalani,
Co-Founder
