According to the current development of intelligent technology, the patented technology of intelligent home can be divided into six technical fields: networking and control technology, intelligent home appliance terminal technology, home lighting control technology, security prevention technology, telemedicine diagnosis and care system, and home environment control system.

Technology distribution: Networking and control technology accounted for the largest proportion

The smart home industry to carry out a detailed classification and the corresponding patent search.Among the above six technology categories, networking and control technology and intelligent home appliance terminal technology account for the most, while home lighting control technology and telemedicine diagnosis and nursing technology account for the least, with the specific proportion shown in Figure 1 (note: 2016 patent application data has not been fully disclosed).

Figure 1 Patent application distribution of smart home fine classification technology

Trend of technical applications: Related patents began to explode in 2011

With the maturity of the smart home industry and the advancement of technology research and development, the number of relevant patents in the global distribution has been increasing year by year since 2011.

FIG. 2 Time evolution of smart home Fine classification technology patent

Next, the small series of the above six areas of technology decomposition, one by one to interpret the patent layout of each technical field, reveal the current smart home industry trend, patent layout strategy, and further point out the corresponding technical breakthrough point and risk avoidance point, to provide a strong reference for innovation and research and development.

World Smart Home Patent Analysis Report (iii)

Technology decomposition: Perforating network and control technology & Patent layout of intelligent home appliance terminal technology

I. Networking and control technology

1. Technology life cycle analysis

Figure 3 Growth rate V trend of networking and control technology with a cycle of 5 years

V trend formula description: technology growth rate = A /A, where A is the number of invention patent applications (or the number of approvals) in the current year;A represents the cumulative number of invention patent applications (or the cumulative number of approvals) traced back five years.After several years of continuous calculation, the v value increases, indicating that the technology is in bud or growth stage.

As can be seen from Figure 3, networking and control technology is in the rapid development stage from 2008 to 2012, and the overall number of applications for this technology continues to increase from 2013 to 2015.

2. Analysis of principal applicants

Figure 4 shows the main applicants for smart home networking and control technologies.Most of the main applicants in the sub-field of network control are home appliance enterprises.LG, SAMSUNG, Midea Group Co.,Ltd., Haier Group Co.,Ltd. and Sichuan Changhong Electric Appliances Co.,Ltd. have many layouts in this sub-field.Among the top ten patent applications, seven are from China.

Figure 4. Ranking of main applicants for networking and control technologies

3. Analysis of important patents in the sub-fields of networking and control technology

It can be seen from Figure 1 that the patent literature of networking and control technology accounts for the largest proportion of patent literature in the whole field of smart home, so the number of important patents screened out is also the largest.In addition, the distribution of important patent literature in this field has a long time span, from the 1980s to this century, the distribution of important patents continues.It is worth noting that important patent documents filed after 2010 account for a large proportion, about 45%.This shows that the development of networking and control technology is earlier, and has been the key area of technology research and development improvement.

Patent filing earlier CN1443324A, name for "improvement of home network based on browser command and control", the application date for the 1998, the applicant is a samsung, the patent document in a public execution on a home network services: network connection more in the family home appliance equipment, the client can display user interface, the user through the software on the client program can through the user interface to control electrical appliances and enables the multiple household appliance to communicate with each other to perform services.The patented technology realizes the control of multiple devices by a control terminal with a single control loop, which can be realized by the display and control on the client, instead of the control on the front panel of home appliance.There are as many as 168 patents of the same nationality in the world, and the patents are distributed in the United States, Canada, Germany, South Korea, Japan, China, Spain and Indonesia, etc., and more than 50 patents have been authorized. At the same time, a large number of the same nationality patents have expired.

Patents that have been cited more than 300 times include US5410326A, US5086385A, US5621662A, US6580950B1, US20010010032A1 and US20040181800A1.Among them, US6580950B1 has been cited by subsequent patent technologies for 14 consecutive years from 2001 to 2015, which has received continuous attention from patent applicants in this field, indicating that this patent must have made groundbreaking technical contributions.The patent provides an Internet-based home communication system for features that allow homeowners to monitor and control their ownership from a distance via a global computer network, creating a prototype for a smart home.

The network control technology involved in the smart home currently includes a variety of wired, wireless and bus network communication technology, and due to the advantages and disadvantages of their own technology, at present is the situation of a hundred flowers bloom, a hundred schools of thought contend, the current period of time to improve the transmission and communication technology adopted by the specific communication technology is also different.For example, CN107367951A applied by Guangdong Power Grid and CN105182918A applied by State Grid Corporation of China both adopt power line carrier technology to build smart home communication systems.The CN107241248 applied by Hefei Danpeng, combined with the use of Bluetooth, Wifi and GPRS wireless transmission technology to achieve intelligent control.Due to the lack of a unified smart home industry standard, product connectivity and industrial scale are limited.All manufacturers should actively participate in the formulation of interface standards and data transmission protocols for smart home related devices, so as to provide norms and guidance for the development of the industry and occupy an advantageous position in the future competition.

In the future, under the Internet of everything system, the combination of a more personalized operating system and the cloud "brain" is the core of giving all things the sense.In order to realize the intelligence of the whole family and perceive the user's behavior, the intelligent home with high artificial intelligence will be the ideal state of the home.CN104869165A, for example through the cloud server and wireless router synchronous exchange of information, to be able to keep terminal information makes the intelligent terminal and home appliance, it realizes the self-learning function of the thermostat, and the function of the intelligent switch to adjust according to the user's habits, and through the user behavior acquisition module and large data servers to the user's location and state of the user behavior prediction, according to the forecast results automatically control the operation of the smart home devices.

It can be seen that the technology development in the sub-field of networking and control technology has gone through the development process of controlling multiple household appliances by a client, Internet remote control home, improving the transmission and control effect of various communication technologies, and the technology development process in the sub-field of networking and control technology in cloud computing and artificial intelligence self-learning in the future.Networking and control technology as an important sub-field of smart home, its development and breakthroughs will certainly have a significant impact on the whole smart home field, the direction of innovative research and layout is bound to become the hot spot in the competition of enterprises in the industry.

Ii. Intelligent home appliance terminal technology

Intelligent home appliances introduce microprocessor, sensor technology and network communication technology into traditional home appliances, which can automatically perceive the state of residential space, the state of home appliances themselves and the service state of home appliances, and can automatically control and receive the control instructions of residential users in the home or remotely.At the same time, as a part of the smart home, smart home appliances can be connected with other home appliances, household appliances and facilities in the house to form a system to realize the smart home functions.

1. Technology life cycle analysis

As can be seen from Figure 5, the technology was in the rapid development stage from 2008 to 2012, and the overall number of applications for the technology was still increasing from 2013 to 2015, among which there was a large increase in 2015.

FIG. 5 Growth rate v trend of smart home appliance terminal technology with a 5-year cycle

2. Analysis of principal applicants

In the field of smart home appliance terminal technology, the top 10 patent applicants in the world are LG, Midea, Haier, SAMSUNG, Changhong, State Grid, LG Electronics, Chengdu Hongyi Tiancheng Technology Co., LTD., Gree and Hisense.

FIG. 6 Main applicant of intelligent home appliance terminal technology

3. Analysis of important patents in the sub-field of intelligent home appliance terminal technology

The development process of intelligent home appliances mainly covers two development stages. The first is the development stage of intelligent ontology, which is widely used in home appliances through sensors, processors and actuators.Secondly, it is the stage of network intelligence, that is, perception and calculation are carried out with the help of network and big data to further improve the perception and computing ability of household appliances.

In the ontology intelligent stage, the patent (US6906617) provides an intelligent home appliance network, which determines the state of the equipment by monitoring the instantaneous power consumption of the equipment, so as to inform the user of the change of the state of the equipment, and realize the control of the electrical equipment through processing equipment and control equipment.The patent fully embodies the development of intelligent technology of intelligent home appliance ontology.Patent (CN102681501B), through the use of AC power relay and AC current sensor, home appliances to achieve error-free remote control.Among them, sensor technology has developed rapidly, including infrared, temperature and biometric sensors, etc., and recognition speed and accuracy have been rapidly developed.

In the stage of network intelligence, data are collected through the real-time online network for analysis and deep learning, so that the intelligent functions of the smart home are significantly increased and the response speed of the device is fast.The patent US7136940B2, for example, can receive external network data by having a removable display with a personal digital assistant that can access the Internet wirelessly or wirelessly.

In the field of smart home appliances, LG Group has accumulated many smart home appliance patents, including JP2002218566A. By setting communication module in home appliances, it sets different IP address for each home appliance, so that the status of home appliances can be sent and remote commands can be received through the power line.Patent KR1020030075728A provides a method to confirm the connection status of home appliances in the home network system;Patent US20040070696A1 provides a refrigerator that can watch TV wirelessly by configuring a Web pad, which overcomes the shortcoming that the refrigerator must be positioned near the TV antenna terminal under the original wired connection mode. Moreover, users can also upload/download data from the Internet connected Web page and search the required data through the connected Web page.It can be seen that LG has been committed to the network technology research of home appliances, and attaches great importance to a convenient, detachable and beautiful wireless technology way of Web pad.

In addition, there are some patent literatures with a large number of the same nationality, which deserve our attention.FOR example, US20170177944A1, the patent name is VIDEO GUIDANCE FOR smart-home DEVICE INSTALLATION (VIDEO GUIDANCE FOR SMART HOME DEVICE INSTALLATION), and the applicant is Google.There are as many as 71 of the same family in the world, and the patents are distributed in the United States, Canada, Europe, Japan and China.CN102611596A, the patent name is network corresponding home appliance, the applicant is Feibit network Co., LTD., the patent in the world is 24 relatives, the patent layout in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia and China and other countries.

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