issue: May 2004 APPLIANCE Magazine Tokyo Report Digital Home Experiments Underway	Share  Printable format  Email this Article  Search
Wasaku Ishida, Japanese correspondent, APPLIANCE magazine and vice president, JARN (Japanese Air-Conditioning, Heating & Refrigeration News) In Singapore, the “Connected Home” project is underway to diffuse services using digital home appliances and broadcasting.

n Singapore, the “Connected Home” project is underway to diffuse services using digital home appliances and broadcasting. As a result of experiments started this year by the Information Communication Development Bureau, it was found that 35 types of service can be commercialized and some technologies have already been introduced into houses now under construction. The purpose of the project, which includes domestic and overseas enterprises and about 400 families, is to benefit inhabitants with improved operability of appliances and to nurture the industry. Participating enterprises include cable TV stations, real estate firms, and appliance makers such as Samsung, LG Electronics, and Philips.

Japan is also doing its share of appliance experiments. In mid-December 2003, Toshiba’s white goods subsidiary, Toshiba Consumer Marketing Co. of Tokyo, launched experiments on networked appliances in Yamanashi City. In cooperation with municipal authorities and Yamanashi University, the company has started its experiments by distributing the control panel “Feminity” for networked appliances (originally launched in April 2002)to homes occupied by elderly people.

In September 2003, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. began utilizing small-power wireless communication in the Kansai District called “Living Net.” Using Matsushita’s technology, home security units, Internet-enabled air-conditioners, refrigerators, washing machines, and microwave ovens, can reportedly be combined or “networked.”

In addition, nine senior high schools began joint experiments on the use of remote control for internet-enabled appliances using the next-generation Internet standard Ipv6.