Tag: Smart home

By Li Qiang, People’s Daily

Many Europeans love taking a sip of the wines from the collection in their cabinets when they get home. Now such experience is made smarter by an intelligent wine cabinet co-produced by renowned Chinese home appliance manufacturer Haier and the world’s largest online wine dealer Vivino.

The cabinet, which was exhibited at the Internationale Funkausstellung Berlin last year together with many other new home appliances and solutions, is able to recognize over 1,000 wine brands, as well as the years and locations of production. It can also be connected to a Haier phone application through which users can buy and manage wines.

The open ecosystem built by Haier has enabled interaction between appliances and users, said Yannick Fierling, CEO of Haier Europe.

Smart home appliances emerged in recent year with the thriving technologies of internet of things, cloud computing and AI, and the COVID-19 pandemic further raised European users’ requirements on the health-friendliness and intelligence of home appliances.

Last June, Haier Europe launched a smart home application on which users can manage home appliances manufactured by Haier and its subsidiary brands. The application also offers immersive interaction solutions and has received two million users.

Fierling told People’s Daily that Haier’s business maintained rapid growth in Europe despite of the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, the sales of high-end home appliances increased 20 percent to 30 percent from 2019, the highest in the industry in Europe.

Apart from building smart ecosystems on the continent, Haier is also working to expand its overseas production capacity. It is reported that a refrigeration production facility of Haier Europe will be put into operation this June in Romania. The plant, with an investment of more than 70 million euros ($85.7 million), employs over 30 robots and is able to produce a million sets of refrigerators on a yearly basis.

Alessia Ianni, Cooling Technical Operation Director at Haier Europe and Managing Director at Haier Tech Romania noted that the plant will play a pivotal role in Haier’s smart home strategy in Europe for its strong capabilities in production, technological transformation and logistics, helping the manufacturer become one of the industrial leaders.

Relying on its solid strength of R&D, production and brand effect, Haier is gaining an increasingly larger influence among European consumers. In recent years, the Chinese manufacturer has won multiple European awards, including the Red Dot Design Award and the Industry 4.0 Award.

Last September, Haier was rated the Shooting Star of the Year in the Customer Recommendation 2020 by German media outlet Handelsblatt, for its brand performance in five assessment dimensions such as general impression, quality, customer satisfaction, value for money and employer image.

Being green, intelligent and sophisticated, “made-in-China” products have reinforced technologies, improved quality and made their names. They are recognized and welcomed by more and more overseas consumers. Acquiring advanced technologies in core areas and striving to become

By Xu Qing, People’s Daily

At an elderly care office in Dashilan neighborhood, Xicheng district, Beijing, a smart display was installed, offering health consultancy and care services for the elderly in the neighborhood through video calls.

Such smart displays were also handed out by the office to some senior residents in need in the neighborhood.”The device not only facilitates the daily life of the elderly, but also improves the efficiency of our service,” said Ma Naichi, head of the office, adding that it also reduces human contacts during COVID-19 response.

With the smart displays, the elderly can control household appliances, check weather forecast, and listen to music. Besides, the smart displays are also connected to a nursing service center co-established by the neighborhood and Chinese tech firm Baidu, which offers food delivery, maintenance and consultation services for the elderly.

Smart displays registered a shipment of 45.89 million units last year in China, a year-on-year increase of 109.7 percent, demonstrating the vitality of the market,according to a report by International Data Corporation (IDC), a premier global market intelligence firm.

While employing intelligent voice interaction technology, smart displays suit the application scenarios in families and are a typical application of conversational AI, said Jing Kun, vice president of Baidu and general manager of the company’s Smart Living Group.

Many other smart products have also been employed by communities to prevent and control COVID-19 and turned out to be very effective and convenient, including intelligent temperature measuring instruments, cell phone-controlled switches and smart elevators that automatically disperse passengers.

At the same time, smart home devices such as smart locks and robot vacuums have already been widely applied in Chinese people’s daily life.

At a prototype smart home designed by a Beijing-based Internet enterprise, lights, air conditioners and air purifiers are turned on automatically under voice control.The television and lights in the living room are controlled by voice, while an intelligent alarm system in the kitchen is monitoring gas, water and electricity safety all the time. Besides, the curtains in the bedrooms are raised automatically in the morning. The robot vacuum can start working even when there is no one in the house through remote control, and the smart locks and cameras installed will generate real-time video and images.

“My robot vacuum and smart washing machine have really made my life easier,” said a programmer surnamed Wang in Beijing’s Haidian district, adding that these smart home products have relieved him very much from household duties.

An online shopping festival was held from April 28 to May 10 by the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the State Post Bureau and the China Consumers’ Association, during which the sales of smart products experienced a 20-percent rise.

China’s smart home market is expected to reach over 581.9 billion yuan ($83 billion) in 2020, according to i Research, a leading provider of online audience measurement and consumer insights in China.

On April 28, the Shanghai Consumer Council issued a list of 21 consumption experience stores in the city that best integrate science,fashion and culture, including the smart home experience stores of Haier – China’s leading home appliances and consumer electronics company, and Chinese tech giant Huawei.

With the full-speed advancement of 5G construction and application, as well as its development and security guarantee, the smart lifestyle displayed in the experience halls will soon become a reality in more and more house holds in China.