Connected Devices Weekly Update/2016-09-08

• User Testing is underway and we have been getting the initial feedback
• The users have the device for 2 weeks and will make lists as well as interact with it. The users were able to successfully set up the device with no help from the team as well as start making lists
• Users will fill out surveys at the beginning of next week as well as the following week
• Interviews will be conducted with each of the users after a week of using the device
• Users are filling out a journal to let us know their initial thoughts and the helpfulness of the device
• Once this test is completed, we should have a good idea of the viability of this product as well as what changes need to be made

An always-on voice-enabled smart screen device to keep track of the activities, events, and to-do lists of family members.

MVP1 Hypothesis that Remains to be Tested

• Offering a solution that provides an alternative way to create and manage reminders, lists & schedules using a smart display, families would be able to accomplish their tasks 20% more times than before. (Pending smart display device to test)

Study 2 for MVP1

• Team is still working to complete the features of MVP1. Progress made on wake word. Background noise seems to be appropriately ignored. Will test for this in the study. Still finishing up front and back ends.
• Weren't able to start internal testing a week ago as planned. Will confirm go/no go criteria for approving start of Cue tablet study.
• Prepared and provided architecture document for security review, but haven't received feedback yet.

• Product concept proposed and next steps are being discussed
• The proposal is called "Totem", which is a sculptural piece that gives your loved one a physical place in your home, ensuring your relationship isn’t lost in a sea of noisy social feeds and missed connections. Use cases includes
  • Indicate availability
  • Engage in quick direct conversation
  • Leave voice message
  • Tune in to other's music listeing / live casting experience (extended use case)

• The main question to be answered: will girls use a wearable in addition to the phone? Does it fit into their lives?
• Planning to test Android smart watch next week with girls to answer this question.
• Talking to Joe about connections between Haiku and Artefact work.

• Team is working to define product and hardware plan by Oct 1.
• Selected and purchased 3 development kits for engineering evaluation as we work towards a define hardware integrated circuit board.
• Received approval to proceed with Go To Market plan for Taipei market test.
• Review User stories with UX and Eng. Next step is to further prioritize list to must haves P1s.
• Continue discussion with team to lock down on HW requirements based on UX driven goal on creating simple and frictionless user experience.
• Project Goals:
  • Evidence from the experiments to show the consumer needs. (consumer service)
  • Defined product (kit) to be prototyped by partner (hardware solution)

Concierge Experiment:

• IN PROGRESS: Week 2 of 3
• Findings:
  • Only 2 out of 12 people are cooking the meals that are suggested
  • Participants are not getting good recipe suggestions so they are not using it
  • Some participants are not getting any recipes (because it chooses 3 random ingredients every time it tries to make a meal suggestion)
  • Some participants are more visual and would like to see pictures of the recipes
  • Hard to test an isolated part of the experiment without be hindered by other aspects of the experiment

Second Image Recognition Experiment:

• IN PROGRESS till next week
• Participant has been taking photos with prototype - 11 photos
• 7 out of 11 were successfully identified
• Findings:
  • Accuracy highly depends on quality of photo taken

Hypothesis 1: If we broadcast schedule content, then spur-of-the-moment attendees can quickly and confidently choose how to spend their time

Experiment#1 in View Source: Use beacons at an event to broadcast room status. Using the aforementioned survey, use targeted interviews for floaters post View Source to see if Magnet helped them make decisions in the moment and if it was easier and faster than their usual methods.

Hypothesis 2: If attendees broadcast their social profiles, then social interaction will increase

Experiment 2 in View Source - Beacon give-away: We'll provide beacons to the first people that go to our booth showing that they have installed the app, help them to configure it and follow up with the them if that increased the number of interactions that they had during the conference and other possible uses.

• Working in the View Source Handbook that include all the logistics, surveys and steps to validate the hypothesis and get the most incomes as we can.
• Shortening/configuring/testing the URLs to be broadcasted via beacons and also via our Magnet Desktop client

Product definition

• Today we have started to work on picking up a specific use case in order to build a concrete product/service.

• Bulleted list item
• Bulleted list item

• Apple Home app on iOS 10 details:
  • Home app - a central point of organization for the connected home setup, with support for new categories of devices, including cameras.
  • Management of devices through the Control Center
  • Apple said nearly 100 home automation products are adopting HomeKit this year, bringing support for thermostats, lights, window shades, door locks, video cameras and more.
  • HomeKit devices and the iOS Home are integrated with Siri

• The first data-collecting sensors in Chicago's smart city initiative went live. The city installed 2 nodes last week as part of the Array of Things project, whose goal is that by the end of 2018 there will be 500 nodes around Chicago. Data from the nodes will be publicly available around the middle of October for free on the city of Chicago's Data Portal and the Plenar.io portal

• Amazon news from IFA Berlin, Europe's largest tech show:
  • LG's upcoming smart home hub will integrate with Amazon's Alexa digital assistant, in a limited fashion at first.
  • Amazon is also certifying smartwatches to work with Alexa
  • Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microchip Technology partnered to develop a provisioning platform and supported secure chip. The hardware, designed by Microchip, will help the platform provide end-to-end IoT security procedures and simplify IoT solutions that operate on AWS.

• The software engineers that have been working on the Nest platform are being moved to Google in order to create a unified Smart Home platform. The combined team will continue to work on Google Home, a smart speaker rival to Amazon's Echo.