As electricity bills and gas prices creep higher and higher, a company that can strip household bills down to the bare minimum has found itself sitting in a sweet spot. Penny share watchers should keep an eye on JSJS Designs (LSE:JSJS).
Last week it said that it would soon be raising money it needs to launch a new range of products for the ‘intelligent home.’
The ‘intelligent home’ does not mean Dad and Mum doing The Times crossword while the children read Latin verse. It means a home that can look after itself, turning off lights and radiators where necessary, sensing when burglars are in the front room, and switching on the central heating when you start back from work.
Most of us have, up to a point, made our homes a little bit more intelligent. The simple thermostat knows that the temperature has dropped and that the boiler should be fired up. We use light activating timer switches in an attempt to conceal that we have gone on holiday.
But it is all rather piecemeal so far. Not many of us have the appetite, time or interest to really get to grips with what is possible. But two developments could change that…
Let your house do the thinking
Two key trends drive a need for smart homes. The first is the rise in domestic heating and electricity bills. All of us, without exception, waste money by heating rooms that are never occupied, by running the central heating even when we are out for the night, and by leaving the television on stand-by.
If we have teenage children the matter is probably much worse and the house is full of electrical devices that are never turned off. Domestic utility bills are unlikely to come down in a hurry and anything we can do to save money in this respect should be attractive.
The other important development is the convergence of traditional consumer electronics with personal computer-based technology. Basically what this means is that we can use our telephone to switch electrical gadgets on and off. You go out to the shops, have a senior moment, think that you might have left the oven on and now, instead of spending the day worrying about it, you can send a message from your handset, via the internet, to your home. The oven, if it was ever on, will be switched off and you can relax.
It makes a lot of sense. But will it ever become a money-spinner for investors? A few things suggest that it might not.
Why I’m worried about smart homes
For a start, the idea of the intelligent home has been around for several years – decades even. It seems like it could be a major business opportunity and consequently it has attracted big players like Dell, Intel and Microsoft from the world of computing and traditional consumer electronics players like Panasonic, Mitsubishi and Siemens.
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The field looks sure to be competitive, but take-up of the products is slow. Most of us are basically pretty happy with what we have and frankly cannot be bothered to change things. If it is too much trouble to turn off the computer overnight, what chance is there that we will turn our homes into showcases of contemporary technology?
This is the crux of the matter. To get real consumer take-up a product has got to be markedly better than what we already have. Offer a mobile phone as an alternative to calling from a public call-box and people will snap it up. It is a clear benefit. But if the proposition is just to save a few quid on the domestic bills, is it really worth going to the expense and trouble of installing new gadgets and learning how to use them?
One penny share though has come up with a business plan that avoids all this hassle. And I think they could be a company well worth watching over the next year…
JSJS could slash your bills
Intelligent homes, with radiators, boilers and lighting that can be remotely operated, are generally perceived to belong to the homes of investment bankers or premiership footballers. Two men, John Sherman and John Sinclair, have set up JSJS Designs and want to change this.
They have come up with a range of ‘plug and play’ dimmers, radiator regulators and other remotely controlled energy saving devices that are easy to fit and can slash your bills in return for an upfront investment of a few hundred pounds.
JSJS intends to license its designs, and have the products manufactured and distributed by others and is about to raise some capital to kick the whole thing off. If you want to know more about its products, JSJS will be at stand C17 at The Gadget Show at Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre on April 13 th-17 th. But if you want to invest in the shares, my advice would be to wait and see whether this concept really catches on.
• This article was first published in Tom Bulford’s twice-weekly small-cap investment email
The Penny Sleuth.