Sigma Designs and Make: want you to submit your smart home IoT ideas.
Have you ever thought about how to make smart homes even smarter? Now’s your chance to put your smart home ideas to the test, in a new Internet of Things (IoT) design contest launched by Sigma Designs and Make:. The Z-Wave Smart Home Maker Challenge is calling on engineers and other makers to submit their ideas for new or improved smart home applications using Z-Wave.
Z-Wave is an increasingly popular communication standard for smart home IoT applications, backed by a consortium of over 600 global member companies called the Z-Wave Alliance. The interoperability layer of the Z-Wave standard is open to the public, so anybody can experiment with their own Z-Wave applications.
Now, with the Z-Wave Smart Home Maker Challenge, experimenting is the name of the game. Sigma Designs and Make: want you to design your own Z-Wave application and bring your creativity to the connected home. Maybe you have a smart home idea that’s been kicking around in your head for a while but haven’t gotten around to making. Now’s your chance to stop making excuses and bring it to light!
The competition consists of two phases. For phase one, entrants will submit the details of their smart home application. This can include schematics, sketches, descriptions and whatever else you want to use to communicate your idea. The deadline for phase one is Oct. 24, and if the judges like what you’ve got, you’ll move on to phase two.
Phase two is when you get a chance to prototype your idea using a provided Raspberry Pi and Z-Wave Developers Kit, along with anything else you need to build your application. You’ll have a few weeks to turn your idea into a reality before the deadline of Dec. 15, and the contest winners will be announced shortly thereafter.
“The maker community is renowned for its inventiveness and creativity, which is why we’re excited to see what they come up with when given full access to the power of Z-Wave,” said Sigma Design’s Carsten Steffensen.“We’re thrilled to launch this competition and look forward to evaluating the imaginative solutions submitted by the maker community.”
Design competitions are a great way to flex your engineering muscles and have fun at the same time. They provide a chance to be innovative and creative and do what every engineer likes best: make something cool.
Good luck!
If you’re interested in learning more about the Z-Wave Smart Home Maker Challenge (like what you can win), check out the contest website. To learn more about the benefits of the Z-Wave standard, read “A Mandatory Security Framework for IoT Devices.”
