The air purifier equipped with a new sensor not only has low noise and low energy consumption, but also can remotely remove aldehydes and supply air with one click; it accurately plans the path and superimposes the mop for self-cleaning, and the upgraded sweeping robot makes daily cleaning easier; real-time video guidance, automatic steam The clean, new all-in-one steaming, baking and frying machine makes kitchen novices fall in love with cooking... As people's lives move towards intelligence, smart home appliances and high-end home appliances have a broader market space, and the trend of structural transformation and upgrading of the home appliance industry has become more obvious. The supply of high-end products featuring green intelligence is sufficient and effective, driving steady progress in industry operations. The Central Economic Work Conference held in December 2023 emphasized “actively cultivating new consumption growth points such as smart homes, entertainment and tourism, sports events, and domestic ‘trendy products’”.
What new changes have smart home appliances brought to life? What are the future development trends? Focus on the interview below.
"Free hands", "lazy people" products are favored
How to extend the shelf life of meat, what are the remedies for over-drying clothes... There are many life wisdom tips on major short video platforms. Behind these are the "hidden needs" of users and the direction of innovation and technology exploration in various smart home appliances.
In order to solve the problem of frozen meat having poor taste and no nutrition, Haier refrigerator pioneered the magnetically controlled cold-fresh technology, which uses a magnetic field to freeze the molecular movement of food ingredients, enabling the preservation of raw meat in the same way as fresh fruit; in order to solve the problem of clothes getting tangled and knotted after using a clothes dryer, To solve the problem of over-drying or drying, Haier washing machine pioneered 3D perspective drying technology, which conducts internal perspective and external inspection of clothes. Through smart algorithms, it can accurately grasp the overall dryness and humidity of fabrics in real time. Heavy clothes such as down jackets and blankets can be seen through in one go. There is no need to dry it twice, and the drying stops immediately, so the clothes will not be damaged by over-drying. In response to the pain point of hot and cold bath water, Haier Water Network has launched dual-cycle constant temperature technology to provide users with a constant temperature and comfortable bathing experience... …Deng Qiuwei, vice president of Haier Smart Home and general manager of whole-house intelligence, said that after more than ten years of accumulation, Haier Smart Home has launched a rich range of scenarios and product applications. Data shows that Haier Smart Home Brain has access to 140+ categories, 400+ ecological categories, 130 million+ network devices, and 2.4 billion monthly scene interactions, providing smart life services to many families.
Chatting, helping with entertainment, doing housework, protecting safety... As more and more "lazy" products are favored, the widespread introduction of smart home appliances is making people's life scenes more and more convenient and intelligent.
“I will put rice in the rice cooker before I go out, and before I get home in the evening, I will remotely turn on the rice cooker through the mobile phone app, so that when I get home, I can have hot meals; during my lunch break, I will start the rice cooker at home on my mobile phone. With a sweeping robot, you will feel better when you see the floor is clean when you get home." Ms. Liu, an office worker in Beijing, said that the purchase of various smart home appliances has made her life easier. "When I get home after working all day, I just want to lie on the sofa and rest more. Now with smart home appliances that can 'free my hands', my happiness has been greatly improved."
Xiao Li, who lives in Xi'an City, Shaanxi Province, had already made a "lazy man" plan when he was renovating his new house early last year. He wanted to build his own smart "nest" in the whole house by using smart appliances. "Through the mobile phone APP, I can remotely control the air purifier at home even if I am not at home. I can also check the situation inside and outside the house through smart cat eyes and monitoring. I can turn on the air conditioner in advance before arriving home." Xiao Li said, although smart home appliances are relatively Ordinary home appliances are slightly more expensive, but they can greatly improve your quality of life.
With the popularization of the Internet and the improvement of people's quality of life, companies in different fields have entered the smart home industry across borders. A variety of products such as smart toilets, smart curtains, and smart door locks have appeared on the market, and their prices are also increasing. The more affordable. During last year's "Double 11", in JD.com's home appliance home broadcast room, household floor washers, vacuum cleaners, smart locks, smart toilets, etc. were the most purchased product categories by consumers in the live broadcast room, and integrated and intelligent home appliances became the first choice for consumption.
In major shopping malls, major brands of home appliances with smart as the keyword or performance introduction are also everywhere, and the market penetration rate of smart home appliances is relatively high. The product display area of Jingdong Home Appliances Chang'an District flagship store in Xi'an is filled with a variety of home appliances such as sweeping robots, smart rice cookers, and smart air conditioners. According to the staff, many customers come to consult and purchase every day. Among them, voice interaction products that can "free hands" are the most popular. Many customers who have newly renovated their houses will equip the whole house with a variety of smart appliances.
As an integral part of smart home, smart home appliances can be interconnected with other home appliances, household appliances and facilities in the house to form a system to realize smart home functions. Relevant data shows that my country's smart home appliance market will exceed 550 billion yuan in 2021 and exceed 650 billion yuan in 2022. New categories of home appliances such as dishwashers and sweepers are developing rapidly, and new types of durable consumer goods are accelerating into the homes of ordinary people.
"With the application of artificial intelligence technologies such as large models, big data, and machine learning, smart home appliances are no longer simple functional home appliances, and their boundaries are constantly expanding. For example, smart TVs are equipped with voice interaction functions, which can be liberated through voice tuning and other functions Users use both hands to improve convenience; another example is that the function of smart refrigerators extends to food management. Through RFID (radio frequency identification), image recognition and other methods, it can sense the name, category and other information of food, and automatically match the appropriate temperature range, shelf life, etc. , the corresponding storage room is recommended, with an alarm function near the shelf life; another example is the smart air conditioner, which realizes the function of avoiding wind and people, and is equipped with a sleep curve. When it senses that the user has entered a sleep state, it automatically adjusts to the sleep mode to provide the user with the most suitable Temperature and wind speed provide users with a comfortable sleeping environment." Jiao Limin, director of the Smart Home and Software Testing Center of the China Household Electrical Appliances Research Institute, said in an interview.
Upgraded innovation, richer scene applications
How to make your home smarter? This is inseparable from technological innovation, which makes home appliances intelligent and interconnected, and has richer scenario applications.
Haier Smart Home Brain has developed the industry's first vertical domain model HomeGPT, which not only allows artificial intelligence to chat like a family member, but also provides proactive services based on the knowledge base in the smart home field.
Different from the question-and-answer mechanical dialogue, Haier Smart Home Brain HomeGPT makes human-computer interaction more "human". Take the air conditioner as an example. If you say "Xiaoyou Xiaoyou, I'm a little cold", the Casarte air conditioner developed by Haier can recognize the user's hidden intention and turn on the heating at the same time. "No problem, I'll help you set it up"; ask Questions about air conditioners can also be answered, "Xiaoyou Xiaoyou, how often should the air conditioner filter be cleaned?" "It is recommended that the air conditioner filter be cleaned every 240 hours to ensure cooling and heating effects and reduce power consumption. Avoid dripping and other phenomena."
In daily life, users not only pursue good air environment, but also eat well. Take the smart kitchen as an example. With HomeGPT capability support, when users want to eat grilled steak, they can talk to the oven and cook by voice. Users only need to tell the type, thickness, part, etc. of the steak, and the oven can finely adjust and adapt to the cooking curve of the ingredients according to the condition of the steak to produce the best taste. In addition, to solve the problem of dirty oil smoke, Haier hoods have innovative effective wind technology. Through the Haier Smart Home Brain, it can self-sensing the oil smoke and external smoke exhaust environment, and self-adjust the wind power, air volume, and wind pressure, so that the wind can truly move with the smoke. Oil smoke has nowhere to hide.
"Relying on the self-developed HomeGPT, Haier Smart Home's brain has become smarter, has richer life skills, and has a better understanding of users' daily needs. It can achieve full-scenario natural interaction and full-house proactive services for users' families," said Deng Qiuwei. .
In recent years, major brands have "let a hundred flowers bloom" in the development of smart home appliances through technological innovation.
In 2023, Midea Group released a human-centered intelligent system focusing on whole-house intelligent solutions, and launched 3 new categories of whole-house intelligent products and 7 new human-centered technology home appliances. "The latest 134N smart home architecture system launched by Midea Whole House Intelligent Technology uses a combination of 1 human-centered intelligent hub, 3 major super terminals, 4 major appliance systems and N kinds of intelligent scenarios. It uses human-centered intelligent cloud computing to connect , perception, and interactive terminals, so that the whole-house smart home appliances can actively provide services, like a furniture customizer who understands you, to meet everyone's different personalized needs." said Shang Zhe, head of Midea's whole-house intelligence.
According to reports, one of the three typical scenarios launched by Midea, the "smoke, stove and air linkage comfort scenario", is one of the scenarios most used by users. It can solve problems such as oil smoke generated during cooking and the unbearable heat of the kitchen during cooking. .
According to user Zhou Xiaoshu’s description, “In a comfortable situation where the stove and air are linked to each other, it will intelligently sense temperature changes and always maintain a comfortable kitchen environment. When the kitchen temperature is greater than 24°C and there is a lot of oil smoke, its reaction speed is very fast. Quickly, it will immediately adjust the power of the range hood so that the oil smoke is quickly eliminated. At the same time, it can also activate the 'stir-frying mode' of the kitchen air conditioner, allowing the cool breeze to blow away the heat in the kitchen, creating a fresh and cool cooking environment."
New consumer demands and the evolution of basic technologies have promoted the upgrade of traditional home appliances to a new generation of future-oriented smart home appliances.
"A new round of scientific and technological revolution, including generative artificial intelligence technology, is pushing smart home appliances and smart home industries to a new turning point. Higher-level application scenarios and innovative products are being nurtured. A new industrial ecology is being reconstructed. The entire The industry is actively deploying," said Gui Zhihui, deputy general manager of the National High-end Intelligent Home Appliances Innovation Center.
At the National Innovation Center for High-end Intelligent Home Appliances, next-generation smart home life scenario solutions represented by home health management are rapidly iterating. According to the user's habits and preferences, it automatically adjusts household temperature, humidity, light color temperature, brightness and other environmental parameters; the healthy recipe data platform automatically identifies the ingredients on the chopping board and selects nearly 90,000 recipes based on the eating habits and physical conditions of family members. Make recipe recommendations; the home health management system collects facial video data of family members, monitors blood circulation in blood vessels, calculates human health index, evaluates stress index, cardiovascular risk, and vascular sclerosis risk index, and prepares for potential dangers. Give guidance...
The realization of the above scenarios relies on R&D breakthroughs in key technologies such as smart home appliance chips, pan-terminal operating systems, and AI large models. "It is precisely because of the innovation and iteration of various underlying key technologies that empower smart home appliance systems, making it possible to provide users with more intelligent and differentiated scenarios and user experiences." Gui Zhihui said.
Obvious advantages and good market development prospects
Policy support, changes in consumer demand, and the rise of basic technologies have provided a good market environment for smart home appliances, with promising development prospects.
In 2023, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the National Development and Reform Commission, and the Ministry of Commerce jointly issued the "Work Plan for Stable Growth of Light Industry (2023-2024)", which clearly proposed to carry out smart home interconnection development actions, strengthen standard guidance and platform construction, and promote household appliances, furniture , hardware products, lighting appliances and other industries are integrated and developed. Actively develop and promote green smart home appliances, leisure and entertainment, personal care and maternal and infant home appliances, healthy kitchen and bathroom, intelligent multi-scene lighting systems, natural material furniture, functional furniture, smart locks and other products. Promote new models such as flexible production, personalized customization, and whole-house customization.
Jiao Limin analyzed that from a policy perspective, smart homes are given to the people as the main carrier of a better life, and are also a new consumption growth point, which will play an important role in expanding domestic demand; from a technical perspective, artificial intelligence technology has been accumulated for more than 60 years. Gradual maturity, especially the emergence of large-scale model knowledge, has brought technical support to the intelligent development of home appliances; from the perspective of consumer demand, the convenience, health, safety, intelligence, energy saving, low carbon and other features brought by smart life are what satisfy An important part of people's needs for a better life. Therefore, the intelligence of the home appliance industry will play an important role in aging, health, low-carbon, energy-saving and other aspects, and the development prospects are promising.
"It is expected that China's smart home appliance industry will continue to maintain a rapid growth trend in the next few years, and the market size is expected to increase steadily." Gui Zhihui said.
However, compared with traditional home appliances, the development of smart home appliances requires the empowerment of artificial intelligence technologies such as human-computer interaction, big data, machine learning, and the Internet of Things, as well as communication technologies. The application of these new technologies in smart home appliances is still at an early stage. During the exploration period, there are also some difficulties in the use of "early adopter" users and market promotion. Jiao Limin gave an example and said, "For example, it is difficult for different devices to communicate with each other, personal privacy is leaked, and the usage is complicated. These difficulties also provide guidance for the development trend of smart home appliances and promote the sustainable development of the industry." In Jiao Limin's view, it should be Promote the standardization construction of smart home appliances and pay attention to the importance of group standards for smart home appliances.
"Smart home appliances need to achieve intelligent control through technologies such as the Internet, sensors, and artificial intelligence. The R&D and application of these technologies require a large amount of capital and manpower investment. In addition, in terms of user experience, smart home appliances need to provide more convenient, smart, and Personalized services, but how to make users feel these advantages and improve user stickiness is also a difficulty that needs to be solved." Shang Zhe analyzed. He believes that in the future, smart home appliances will develop in a direction that is more intelligent, more energy-saving, environmentally friendly, and more humane. Through technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data, they will achieve more intelligent control and provide more convenient and personalized services.
The smart home appliance industry has broad development prospects. While "running fast", it must also "run steadily". In the process of rapid development, it is not only necessary to solve stuck technologies such as key chips, algorithms, and software, but also pay attention to the security of user data. question.
As smart home appliance systems introduce a large number of ubiquitous sensing, remote control, AI and other technical means, smart home appliance systems involve a large amount of personal and family privacy data. Data security is undoubtedly an important factor that cannot be ignored in the healthy development of the smart home appliance industry. Only by simultaneously solving common key technologies such as the underlying chips and sensors of smart home appliances, pan-terminal operating systems, data security and privacy protection, and large-model scene innovation can industrial development achieve steady and long-term progress.
"By closely grasping the development trend of high-end, intelligent, and scenario-based products, making up for shortcomings and forging long boards, breaking through common key technologies in the industry, and accelerating the transfer and commercial application of innovative technological achievements, my country's high-end smart home appliances and related The position of the industry in the global value chain." Gui Zhihui said.
Content source: People’s Daily Overseas Edition
Reporters: Ye Xiaonan, Yang Yu, Yang Jiaxi
