Casa Capace

What is Casa Capace

Casa Capace has been developed specifically to cater for Australians requiring Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA). They enable more than a attractive home, with greater flexibility and value for participants of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). The mission is to challenge the unmet demand for SDA housing to positively influence the lives of thousands of NDIS participants, their families, friends and those who care for them.

The Brief

Casa Capace was looking to integrate the latest in smart home technology into their builds. I was asked to join the project as the Automation Specialist to develop a smart home system that caters towards all areas of disability and integrate as an end to end solution into the home.

Platfrom Development

Over the course of 3 years I worked closely with the Casa Capace Team, Architects, SIL Partners, NDIS Participants and our partners to find the needs of future tenants of these homes. When interviewing and surveying the NDIS community the biggest thing that came back was:

I want my future home to give me my ability back and integrate into my life.

The whole Casa Capace smart home platform was built with this single quote in mind and completely changed the trajectory of the system.

After doing qualitative and quantitative research I formulated the following main How Might We statement

How might we enable participants of all sectors of disability and provide them with ability not achieved before

To achieve this HMW I started working with ABB, KNX and Apple to formulate a solution. From the start of this journey it became evident that no company in the southern hemisphere had developed this type of solution before and no one in the world had achieved this solution on such a large scale. For areas of the home such as lighting, blinds and AC it was pretty easy to integrate and find solutions for but for other areas of the home such as doors, intercom and kitchen benches the lack of technical development in these fields made the process that much harder. It also was 10x harder due to the platform we chose to progress with, Apple HomeKit.

The reasoning behind selecting Apple HomeKit as our proprietary home automation interface was for 3 main reasons:

Apple's integration with and dedication to accessibility and accessibility hardware. When thinking of the technical development of accessibility and technology there is no other major tech company than Apple that has done as much work to make access to technology a human right. Due to this integration and my research into other platforms, Apple HomeKit became the only viable option that gives our participants the widest range and access to accessibility into the home. From right out of the box, accessible hardware can be setup with different areas of the home.
Apple's dedication to privacy and security. When developing for a valurnable market their privacy and security is one of the most important aspects to consider and with smart speakers and tracking technology throughout the home we didn't want to create a data mining environment where people who were most valuable were minded for their data. Apple's strong privacy around the Apple HomeKit and Siri platforms meant that participants who chose to use HomeKit could be assured their data was not going to be missued.
Apple HomeKit's reliable and strong architecture. Due to HomeKit not needed a cloud connection to function it meant that participants could still use their phones or voice to control the home even when the internet was down. This local connection vs cloud connection meant that control of lights, blinds or doors was instant compared to the second long delays found with cloud based systems from Google and Amazon.

One major area that came up the researching this field was time, participants can often take much longer to complete everyday tasks. Meaning if someone needs to use the bathroom it takes a considerably longer time to get out of bed and get to the bathroom with or without help. When looking at how the home could help participants with these tasks I took a deep dive into a wide range of sensors such as room sensors, IR sensors, people counters, iBeacons and others to build into the walls of the home. If the home could collect and process data to help peoples lives it can remove stress and pain from tasks.

Platform Solution

The Casa Capace smart home housing platform became the worlds first end to end integrated Apple HomeKit home for people with disabilities, but what does this mean? This home was the first commercial product to be built off KNX and be integrated with the Apple HomeKit platform. The home allows for the automation and control of lighting, blinds, AC, doors, kitchen benches, music and TV's via smart phones and voice. KNX allows us to build the home off a future proof technology which allows for retrofitting and expansions into the future, it also allows for flexible integration with millions of products into the home

Doors

One major hurdle with accessible developments is door access and part of the solution was to make them a seamless part of the home, providing access to anyone without help from a support worker. This is where I worked with Assa Abloy to integrate the first door into the Apple HomeKit platform. This means supported doors can be operated via the Apple Home App or via Siri to open and close. This removes a major problem space around reachability and access for people in wheelchairs and mobility issues as they no longer need to carry a keycard and reach for the scanner, pull down a handle and push a heavy door open or call for help from a support worker. The integration with HomeKit gives them the full ability to just leave and enter at their leisure, thus giving them ability back.

Bathrooms

Another major space for exploration is the bathrooms, with participants requiring a long time to get ready to go to the bathroom it can be tricky in a group environment to get ready to go and have the bathroom occupied by another person. To combat this I integrated sensors around the house giving participants the ability to ask Siri or check Apple Home and see if someone was in the bathroom removing the stigma and issues around getting ready to find the bathrooms occupied by someone else.

It also provides piece of mind for support workers working inside the home giving them the ability to quickly check if someone is still in the room for too long and may require help.

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Lighting, Blinds and AC

The solution also provides easy automation of lighting, blinds and AC. Giving easy access to creating scenes, or controlling individual devices. This video below demonstrates the 'good morning' scene setup to provide participants easy access to turning on lights, opening blinds and turning on the TV via voice without the need of a support worker. This majorly changes participants lives as they could now complete simple tasks without the need of a support worker, further giving them their ability back.

Kitchen Benches

Moving over to the kitchen, we have a completely accessible space with a height adjustable island and back bench. This enables people in wheelchairs to use this space with little issues at all. With the benches being integrated into Siri and the Home App it gives participants the ability to create preset scenes to prepare the room to their height, meaning they can roll in with their wheelchair and say "Siri, its me" and have the room readjust to a height that work for them. This integration is also the first of its kind in the world. In the video below it shows how the kitchen benches work with Siri.