REVENUE STRATEGY - HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTS

Health-conscious people are encouraging a new kind of High-Tech Home.

So companies emphasize the health benefits of their technology, in part because women are playing a bigger role in tech purchasing - and women are more likely to consider the health implications of what they buy.

1. Select Comfort’s Sleep Number bed has controllers and air chambers that let users set personalized comfort levels for their side of the bed. It is investigating new products that would help regulate those rhythms with natural sleep aids like lighting control and watches that calculate a body's high and low points during the day. It targets the more than 70 million people in the US affected by sleep troubles and more than 48 million people who regularly use prescription sleep aids.
2. Logitech International and Microsoft spend millions trying to make mice and keyboards that are more ergonomically friendly.
3. IOGEAR, a maker of computer accessories, devised a wireless mouse coated with titanium oxide and silver nanoparticles, which attract and react with water and oxygen molecules to give off free oxygen ions that help continuously disinfect the mouse's surface.
4. Game maker Nintendo has aerobic software paired with its Wii and DS consoles. The International Sports Sciences Assn. in February endorsed the Wii as a way to help an increasingly overweight population, particularly in developed nations, get a workout while having fun.
5. Apple and Nike teamed up to cater to that same impulse last year by releasing a Nike + iPod Sport Kit that lets you track a run and listen to music at the same time.
6. 4HomeMedia and Pie Home are working on software that could help installers, consumer electronics makers, and retailers navigate the myriad of different networking products and standards to manage devices in the home more effectively.

Old revenue rule – find and fulfill a need.

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