Local company lets you control home via internet

Improving Tomorrow's new C.H.A.D. system can program needs from heat to a.m. coffee.

By David Rogers
Staff writer

LONG BEACH — By the year 2000, everyone was supposed to have an automated home that could automatically turn on the lights, set the thermostat and play some music when you walk through the door. And a personal robot that could serve you a drink.

Most people have forgotten about the robot, but home automation systems are on the rise: The market for home control systems is expected to total about $2 billion this year, up from about $1.5 billion two years ago, according to ABI Research. These systems go a lot further than your father's old lamp timer; and while they won't serve you a drink, they can be set to brew you a fresh pot of coffee whenever you want.

From their 1920s Spanish-style home in the 2900 block of Cedar Avenue,

Kevin Horn and Dennis Sonny are hoping to capitalize on that growth. Their two-year-old company, Improving Tomorrow, offers the Central Home Automation Director or C.H.A.D. which they tout as a relatively inexpensive, easy-to-use product that can control almost every electronic device in a house.

"We envision being able to control your home from a car or a plane," through an Internet-enabled cell phone or an Internet connection on some airliners, said Sonny. More than 2,000 people have bought the system, which starts at $229 for a basic package with software for a Windows PC and a single module to control a lamp. Additional modules run from $14 for a lamp switch to $250 for a thermostat controller, and everything can be controlled by a remote control with a 100-foot range.

Other companies sell home automation products, which range in functionality and ease of use, and cost from a few hundred dollars to more than $1,000. One of the oldest is the X10 system; its ActiveHome device, which can control X10's modules from a PC, starts at $100. C.H.A.D. also uses X10 modules, but Sonny said that his software is more user-friendly.

Millions of homeowners already program their lamps, thermostats, sprinklers and coffee makers with timers. But Horn and Sonny said that more than 2,000 people have bought their system because it automates the automation by adding to the list of things home computers can do.

Horn and Sonny don't release financial information about their privately held company, but Sonny said that their business is profitable and that business has been booming in the last three months.

The two met at Rockwell Collins, where Sonny was a manufacturing adviser, and Horn helped to develop in-flight entertainment systems.

But development on C.H.A.D. really began about five years ago, when Horn started it as a senior project at Cal Poly Pomona. He showed his project to friends, and they made suggestions. "It just kept growing, and I just kept adding features," he said.

The company doesn't promote their product as a security system, but C.H.A.D. can use a cable or DSL Internet connection to send an e-mail to a user's cell phone when a motion detector is set off; the user can then check security camera footage through an Internet connection elsewhere.

Those features and others like downloading TV schedules so you can automatically switch your TV set on and dim your lights for your favorite shows cost an additional $12.95 a month. But most of the home automation features will work without the Internet features, Sonny said.

Sir Wheeler, a spokesman for electronics re-seller Mason Technologies in Richmond, Va., said that he likes what he's seen from his installation inside his own home.

"It's not complicated," he said. "I can set the temperature in my room and turn on the fan (from) my living room, even though I'm not in the bedroom yet."