Homegrown hardware startup Ambi Climate has launched a crowdfunding campaign this morning for its smart air conditioning device. Taking to the Singaporean social Launchpad Crowdtivate, Ambi is armed with the noble goal of keeping users comfortable while saving the environment.
The Ambi team has been hard at work for the past two years doing Asia-focused research on user behavior, air conditioning usage and performance. After surveying 4,000 prospective online users across 10 markets across Asia, Ambi has found that the main challenges that AC users face is maintaining comfortable indoor conditions and minimizing cost and their carbon footprint.
[UPDATE: Ambi will award up to 25% rebate to members of the winning team, so if you backed Ambi, here’s how to join #startupshk team:
- Post “Just got #ambified. I backed Ambi Climate with #startupshk team. Come join me bit.ly/ambi_crowdfunding” on their Facebook Page or on your twitter account – if #startupshk team gets first place, you will get 25% rebate!!
- Fill out form to let Ambi know your FB account or twitter that you used to post the above
- Check status of team ranking here
“Current remote controls encourage the user to focus on power and temperature buttons, so it is unsurprising that many users engage in inefficient on/off control behaviour – they switch on their ACs when they are hot, and switch them off when it gets too cold. The resulting ‘yo yoing’ in temperature, as some of our research participants called it, is both uncomfortable and a waste of energy,” said founder and CEO Julian Lee in a release. “They have also complained about needing to adjust their ACs as much as every 30 minutes, and some habitually wake up in the middle of the night to adjust the settings.”
Using proprietary machine learning and big data techniques, Ambi predicts at-home conditions, takes into account local weather patterns and learns user preferences to create a holistic profile of the home. This way, users can sleep sound without having to constantly adjust their AC settings.
More than just a helpful add-on to your air conditioning unit, Ambi can also educate users on the impact of their usage behavior with deep, data-driven insights into their home conditions. For example, you might be more motivated to close your blinds during the day to cut down on heat trapped in the home, if you saw how much energy you were saving per day.
Essentially, Ambi is going to help you come up with many life hacks for the home – and that to us is worth backing.
Follow this link to back Ambi’s crowdfunding campaign!
Julian Lee on Startbase.HK: Julian Lee
