About Halo Collar: Halo Collar allows you to safely allow your dogs to have a life off leash!

Key Questions and Topics from this Episode:

(00:53) Intro to Ken Ehrman

(07:43) Intro to Halo Collar

(15:09) How did you manage hardware challenges - like battery - while developing the Halo Collar?

(30:02) What trends have you seen in the Consumer IoT world?

(37:16) What does the future of Halo Collar look like?

Transcript:

- [Announcer] You are listening to the IoT For All Media Network.

- [Ryan] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the IoT For All podcast on the IoT For All Media Network. I'm your host, Ryan Chacon one of the co-creators of IoT For All. Now, before we jump into this episode, please don't forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, or join our newsletter at iotforall.com/newsletter to catch all the newest episodes as soon as they come out. But before we get started, does your business waste hours searching for assets like equipment or vehicles and pay full-time employees just to manually enter location and status data? You can get real-time location and status updates for assets indoors and outdoors at the lowest cost possible with Leverage's end-to-end IoT solutions. To learn more, go to iotchangeseverything.com, that's i-o-t changes everything dot com. So without further ado, please enjoy this episode of the IoT For All podcast. Welcome, Ken, to the IoT For All podcast. Thanks for being here this week.

- [Ken] Thank you so much for having me, Ryan.

- [Ryan] Yeah, it's great to have you. I'm excited to have this conversation. Why don't we start off by talking a little bit more about you just individually so our audience has some more context, and give a quick background to yourself, kind of how you got into this space and anything you think will be relevant.

- Sure, I'm kinda old, so I'm in my early 50s, but when I graduated college, I was an engineer. I went to Stanford, and I got a job in Silicon Valley focused on, they were really the pioneer in the Internet of Things. I would say-

- [Ryan] Okay, yeah.

- [Ken] If you had to name a company that was the first, the company was called Echelon, E-c-h-e-l-o-n. It was founded by one of the founders of Apple, Mike Markkula, and one of the founders of a company called ROLM, where the O is for Ken Oshman. Their goal for Echelon was to be the chip in everything else, except for computers. They're like Intel can have the computers, and we'll be in the light switches and the air conditioning systems and-

- [Ryan] Gotcha.

- [Ken] Everything else can be smart. And I loved the company after a year being there and just falling in love with the benefits a smart technology could bring. I ended up leaving to bring smart technology to the RFID industry.

- [Ryan] Okay.

- [Ken] So back then, tags were very cheap, but they were always more expensive than a bar code. So it was a really tough business case. And people always said, well, if it just was more volume, it would cost less. But because it doesn't cost less, there's not a lotta volume. So it was a chicken and egg problem. And what I decided was, let's just make the RFID tag smart by putting intelligence into the tag to make decisions on its own, to bring real benefits to the point where you could charge, and we did, $2,000 a tag.

- [Ryan] Wow.

- [Ken] And it's crazy, but it provided many thousands of dollars in benefits every month. So it was worth it, because our customers were not just tracking their assets, but they were making sure that they were utilized efficiently and safely. So we were basically, our tags were on, by the time I left the first company I started that was based on this Echelon technology, we were on about 500,000 high-value assets-

- [Ryan] Wow.

- [Ken] For half the Fortune 500. And it was a public company called ID Systems. And we grew from an idea to make RFID tags smart to really using that intelligence to make businesses safer and more efficient. But then, unfortunately, due to a personal issue, I had to leave my first baby to tend to my second one who needed me, who's doing much better now. But as a result, I was no longer at ID Systems. But about six months thereafter, my niece's dog got out of their invisible fence and was run over by a car.

- [Ryan] Oh, wow.

- [Ken] And it was really traumatizing. My kids hadn't experienced a death yet, and they loved their dog, and same with my nieces. And it was really just like a tragedy, but out of that tragedy, I was thinking to myself, this is a problem I could fix, because-

- [Ryan] Sure.

- [Ken] I knew for Avis, for example, they wanted to know what space number the cars were parked in to optimize their efficiency. So I knew GPS was now accurate enough to literally replace the wire that's been around for in-ground fences in the dog industry for 25 years. You know, that's just the way it's done. So for people who aren't familiar with the technology, invisible fences are a cost-effective way to keep your dog safe and not running into the street. So people used to put in, well, what happens is, you get a dog.

- [Ryan] Yep.

- [Ken] And then you say, huh, this dog wants to get out, wants to go out, outside. And then you say, well, wait a minute. If I let them out, they're gonna run away. So the problem is when your dog is either inside or when they're outside, they're on a leash. So people might wanna fence in their yards, which, when I bought my house, that was the first thing I wanted to do for my dog, it was extremely expensive. This was eight and a half years ago. I thought a fence would be pretty inexpensive, but it turned out to be, I think, $20,000. I was like, what?

- [Ryan] My parents did the same thing. Yeah, they did the same thing. Instead of doing an electric fence, they did a backyard fence and it's not any cheaper.

- [Ken] We couldn't believe it. And so we ended up getting an invisible fence. So I had the invisible fence. My dog was trained on it eight and a half years ago. And I knew about all the problems that it'd have like wire getting cut all the time, couldn't take my dog with me. Like my brother, who I started this company with, he, always the smarter and better-looking brother, by the way, but in any event, he lived in town. So I would wanna bring my dog with me to his house and let him play with their dog, but my invisible fence wasn't compatible with their invisible fence. So I had to have my dog on the leash, and she would just fight and bark, and wanna get off and play with my brother's dog, and I couldn't let her. And so it got to the point where I wouldn't even bring her any more.

- [Ryan] Um-hum.

- [Ken] Which is crazy. But she wanted to play and who can blame her? So at that very moment, I was like, wow, we can really change this industry. It's kinda based on some antiquated technology. And, as a result, it's very expensive. So it's an amazing business ring, obviously.

- [Ryan] Sure.

- [Ken] But in the case of ring, you're convincing someone to buy $100 doorbell where most people, the doorbell's $10. So it's more than normal. In this case, the invisible fence is two to $3,000. So paying $999 or $799 right now 'cause we have a sale, but to get it out there is not the, so that's money, sets up instantly, and keeps your dog safe, which is the most important thing about it.

- [Ryan] Yeah, so why don't you go ahead and kind of just jump in a little bit more to the product itself, kind of what the offering is. Obviously, you've alluded to kind of the features and kinda how it works at a high level, and what it can replace that is out there now. But just talk a little bit more about just kind of the general, the product itself, kind of what it does, the purpose of it, and what you've kind of learned so far from having it out in the market.

- [Ken] Great, well, first of all, I know this is a podcast so you can't see what it looks like, but I'm putting it up here for you to be able to see. But basically, in many respects, it's like an iPhone for dogs or a smartphone for dogs. Because it has built into it the ability to communicate to the dog. So we have a speaker in here that outputs various sounds. According to Cesar Millan, who I haven't even mentioned him yet, but he's been our partner for the last three years, helping us to understand how dogs think and will respond to sounds and vibrations, and static if necessary, to keep them safe. All of that, we have taken that wisdom that he brings to the table and built it into the Halo Collar. But the point is-

- [Ryan] Okay.

- [Ken] That you have a speaker here so you can have sounds. So for me, when my dog nears the edge of the fence, it beeps; the same thing the old wire fence used to do.

- [Ryan] Sure, sure.

- [Ken] So it just goes beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep.

- [Ryan] Gotcha.

- [Ken] And she knows what that means, and that means beep means fence. And then what's amazing about it, and she learned it eight and a half years ago, is if I take her to other places that she doesn't even know and I let her off and she hears that beep, she knows what it means, she just stops.

- [Ryan] Yeah, that's amazing.

- [Ken] It's crazy.

- [Ryan] Yeah.

- [Ken] The first day she did that, I literally was jumping for joy. I mean, I knew it was supposed to work, but I was like, that's sick, it really works.

- [Ryan] Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's awesome.

- [Ken] So there's a speaker to communicate with the dog. There's vibration, which again, will help get the dog's attention, which you can custom configure. We also have dog whistles built in, so you couldn't even hear it, but the dogs can hear it.

- [Ryan] Okay.

- [Ken] We have Caesar's famous sound built in, and then we have static. And to some people, that's kind of controversial, but it really shouldn't be, because it's like anything-

- [Ryan] Why is that?

- [Ken] It's how it's used.

- [Ryan] Why is static controversial, by the way?

- [Ken] Hum, many people equate static with a shock. And by the way-

- [Ryan] Oh, okay, I see. Okay, I gotcha.

- [Ken] Yes, that's a big problem. And to be honest, that's how the invisible fence trained my dog originally, which was-

- [Ryan] Sure.

- [Ken] It's through pain. Like, you don't want to cross this fence. If you hear that beep, that means you're about to get shocked. And that's how my dog learned it, and that's not how we do it.

- [Ryan] Right, right.

- [Ken] Not at all. Caesar doesn't believe in that.

- [Ryan] Yes.

- [Ken] So it's really, you're training your dog, beep means fence.

- [Ryan] Yes.

- [Ken] And this is something that Caesar came up with as well, that no one has and no one had ever thought of, but when you put Caesar in a room and say, what could this do, this is what he came up with, whistle means come back.

- [Ryan] Okay.

- [Ken] And it's two basic things. But what's amazing about the whistle, and I use this every day with my dog, is now I can take her on a hike off-leash and let her run, and then, and by the way, in my town, you're supposed to have your dog on a leash, but I will walk her off-leash. And then if there's people coming in the other direction with a few dogs on a leash, pulling and yanking their neck, I hit the whistle button on my phone. It's like a video game. She runs right back to me every time.

- [Ryan] Wow, yeah.

- [Ken] And what's crazy is she used to not listen. I would call her name, like Reeses, and she's smart. Like I always thought she was like the smartest dog, but she maybe listens like 20% of the time when I call her name.

- [Ryan] They have selective hearing, a lotta dogs do.

- [Ken] Right. Well, I asked Caesar why; it was very interesting. I said, "Caesar, why do they not listen "when you call their name?" He said, "Well, Ken, you use Reeses's name "for so many different reasons. "So they don't understand why you're calling their name "or that you mean you want them to give you their attention "because that's not the command for that "or the feedback for that."

- [Ryan] Sure, sure.

- [Ken] So you might say, "Oh, Reeses, you're so cute," while you're petting her, so they don't understand that. That's why if you follow Cesar's training, the best way I could explain it is, I also happen to have the ring doorbell. And every time she hears that sound, she barks.

- [Ryan] Um-hum, yeah.

- [Ken] Every time.

- [Ryan] Our dog does the same thing.

- [Ken] Right. And she could be eating a steak dinner, but she's barking because she knows someone's at the door.

- [Ryan] Yep, definitely.

- [Ken] If you follow this process for 21 days, they are gonna know it the same way your dog knows ring means someone's at the door. Because you repeat it, you repeat it, you repeat it.

- [Ryan] Agreed.

- [Ken] And now my dog gets it. Beep means fence, whistle means come back. And when I walk past those people, they were like, what, I don't understand what just happened. I said, "Yeah, she's on a wireless leash." And they were amazed. And then you could just keep walking, then you let her explore, explore. If a car's coming, you hit the whistle, she comes right back. I mean, it is really a cool way to give your dog the ability to kind of be off-leash. But I don't know how I got off the product, but I'm sorry about that.

- [Ryan] Yeah, totally fine.

- [Ken] Should we go back to that? So it has all those different methods of communicating with them.

- [Ryan] Okay, gotcha.

- [Ken] Which you can use in different ways, by the way. The fence, which is the fundamental thing, that's feedback the dog will get, your dog will get, if they wander beyond what you define on your phone, we have like a Google map view of your house or the beach or a park, and you basically just draw the fence on your phone. That gets downloaded, because remember I said it's like an iPhone. This has, inside of it, Bluetooth, cellular, Wi-Fi, different methods of communicating like static and vibrate, and everything else, and also sound. So it's rugged enclosure. I mean, it really has almost everything you would have in your iPhone. But what the point is, it has the memory on here. It stores those fences, and you can then let your dog off-leash in a park, or I have people who use it, who told me they use it at work. I have people who told me they obviously have used it at the beach and at parks.

- [Ryan] Yeah, yeah.

- [Ken] Really anywhere. And the dogs that are trained fully, beep means fence and whistle means come back, you really can take advantage of it. Because even if you set up an area in a public space and someone's coming, you just hit that whistle button, and they will really just come back.

- [Ryan] So that's basically the, aside from the microphone part, the geofencing component of the tool that it seems to be. So we actually had one of these sent to us to play with and try out, and a friend of mine used it on her French bulldog. It's a puppy.

- [Ken] Wow.

- [Ryan] Well, puppyish, but she has horses, so she goes to a horse farm, and it's just open all over the place. But she used it to build basically the geofence around certain areas where the dog could and could not go, and she said it worked flawlessly. The app was very intuitive; obviously came in a very sleek packaging. And she just said like, it was super-seamless for her to get it set up. The one thing she did mention, and I wanted to ask you just kind of your experience when it comes to the battery life component of this. Because obviously, the collar can only be so big, and the battery then can only be so big. So what were the kind of experiences you had trying to find a battery that would last long enough for this to be useful without it being something that only could go a couple hours. Because, for her, it was, every night she recharges. The next day, it was at full capacity, just 'cause she didn't know what was gonna happen the next day. But what is the experience and the development of this product when it comes to battery life? 'Cause that is a very real challenge companies face regardless of what they're building an IoT device for.

- [Ken] Absolutely, absolutely. In fact, I would say back when my brother and I were doing this for the Fortune 100 companies, we would do it on tractor-trailers, and they wanted a five or 10-year battery life. But they wanted reporting updates of where their trailer was every few seconds.

- [Ryan] Exactly, just the math doesn't add up, right? Yeah.

- [Ken] Exactly. So it's amazing, and it's all about trade-offs and that is a fantastic question. And it really also depends on the application. Because a few things are going on right now, certainly as it relates to our product and battery life. One is with the most current Internet of Things, chip technology, whether it's u-blox or Redpine or Silicon Valley, it's just all the different major companies that are in Internet of Things chips, they're all focused on power. And there are, amazingly, even with the GPS chip, they're like four levels of power that you can set your chip to draw, but then it's a trade-off between that and how quickly it's going to wake up and get a GPS fix. And therefore, how deeply do you put it to sleep? And so for us, we wanted to have the GPS receiver on all the time. That was super-critical to me-

- [Ryan] Right.

- [Ken] In the design of the product. Because as soon as you go off, you stop collecting data that is used to make sure that you can collect accuracy information. You have to be outside, when you turn a cold start on a GPS receiver, you might have to be outside for at least two minutes before you start getting accurate data. And that wasn't gonna fly for our customers because the dog could go right out the front door. So we had to have the receiver on all the time, but there were other things that we could turn off. So, for example, the Wi-Fi and the cellular connection.

- [Ryan] Um-hum, um-hum.

- [Ken] So if someone is not in the app, well, then you don't have to provide data back to the app about where your dog is, because why would you have to? 'Cause they're not looking, no one's looking.

- [Ryan] Right, right, right, right.

- [Ken] So you kind of have to think about the, I mean, I can't tell you how many hours of time we went through all the different Applications of when you can turn which parts of your system on and off. But we happen to get kind of lucky that in this application, the standard in the industry is you take the invisible fence collar or unwired collar off at night-

- [Ryan] Okay, right, sure.

- [Ken] Even regular invisible fence collars.

- [Ryan] Sure, sure, it makes sense.

- [Ken] So it made perfect sense that if we could have one day of battery life, A, people are used to that with their iPhones, and B, it's the same basic thing you're doing with the current invisible fence. You just, instead of just taking it off and throwing it on a desk, you're taking it off and plugging it into a charger. So this application, like if you tried to tell Walmart with their 50,000 trailers that you're gonna have to charge the battery every week in the trailers, they're gonna tell you that it's not gonna happen.

- [Ryan] Yes, I agree.

- [Ken] So it's probably one of the first most important things that you need to do when you're designing an IoT product. Just consider that our case, especially because what we ended up going to, at least at my former company, was solar, but there's a lot of issues with that, too. From the size, it doesn't really. So we're not gonna put a solar panel on the back of a dog.

- [Ryan] Yep. No, I mean, but your point is well-taken. I mean, I think it's just the fact that, just like with any component of an IoT solution or product, like the connectivity has to be correct for the Applications, the battery life has to be correct for the Applications. And if you get any of those wrong, they influence not only the experience, but also the cost. And the cost could be a deterrent for somebody whether it's an enterprise looking to track 50,000 trailers or an individual consumer tracking one of their dogs. It just has to fit across the board not just functionality-wise, but also to make the price point something that is affordable. And that makes total sense.

- [Ken] Um-hum, that was definitely part. But if I was gonna, and I know this was potentially one of the upcoming questions, but I'm gonna mention it.

- [Ryan] Yeah, sure, sure.

- [Ken] I was gonna think about the most complicated part of this.

- [Ryan] Yeah, that was gonna be my next question. Perfect.

- [Ken] Well, I would say, first of all it's crazy, but again, I will just say that my brother and I have been developing this type of technology for 25 years. So we were using all the best practices, all the resources that we knew, like from an antenna designing capabilities, to designing for rugged environments, like we were doing. We put all the expertise together, and Cesar Millan, the Dog Whisperer, for the dog component of it, and put this into one thing that all had to work together seamlessly. And that was by far the hardest part.

- [Ryan] Sure.

- [Ken] So like high level, I would say, that there were so many bugs, not just in what we were doing there, because we find all these different Applications-

- [Ryan] Sure, of course, of course.

- [Ken] And different things that are going on, But in every chip that we were designing in.

- [Ryan] Sure.

- [Ken] So, and they had bugs. And then IoT Hub, which we used, they had bugs. So everyone's got bugs, and all those bugs affect each other. And then they fix their bugs, then you have to go back and fix the fixes that you've made to fix their bugs. It's crazy. But you really, in order to keep up with that, you have to really have state-of-the-art kind of ability to see that happening in real time and understanding what you're looking at, and then making the ability to change that. But to give you an idea, we're on version 92, or maybe 93 today, of our firmware.

- [Ryan] Wow.

- [Ken] That's a lot of revisions.

- [Ryan] I will say, I mean, the hardware component to any IoT solution usually seems to be the trickiest. There's a lot of different components that have to go into it. They all don't come from the same place. And the sophistication of each piece is not always the same. The hardware still has a long way to go to be something that is seamless from an adoptive standpoint but at the same time, from a cost standpoint. Because, I mean, for instance, in this case, the dog collar can only be so big. So your form factor only can be, it has to work within these parameters, and you don't have much wiggle room, because you can't put, like for instance, this Frenchie dog, who's 10 pounds, if that, you can't put a massive collar on the neck. And the same with a large dog, you can't put a small collar. So you have to have this variability that plays into the development of your product, while at the same time, keeping the experience and the intended usage or Applications viable for what you're building for.

- [Ken] Definitely. I mean, by the way, so many things, just this, this was designed, the Halo Collar device, that you could attach it to your existing strap. But we also want it 'cause we knew we were gonna take it off and on very frequently, we wanted to make sure it had a collar that kind of like snapped on or off.

- [Ryan] Yeah, sure, sure.

- [Ken] If you can hear this.

- [Ryan] Ah, yeah, I can hear it, yep.

- [Ken] That was critical, but not really in version one. Version one was a belt.

- [Ryan] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, right. It's a prototype. You're starting just to prove the technology works. Because anybody can build a collar. It's whether you can build a smart collar like this.

- [Ken] Right, well, what's funny is the, okay, I never got back to the biggest challenge. It was keeping everything working together because they all have bugs.

- [Ryan] Right.

- [K