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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Inirv

Ome CEO Akshita Iyer Talks Second-Generation Smart Stove Knob

Last month, smart kitchen startup Ome launched its second generation smart knob, a retrofit device that gives gas or electric stoves the ability to be turned off remotely. The new knob comes three years after the company fulfilled the delivery for its first-generation knob (under the company’s then-name, Inirv), which was the culmination of a crowdfunding journey launched by the company’s founders.

I first connected with company CEO Akshita Iyer back in 2016 when the company, then-named Inirv, was a finalist in the Smart Kitchen Summit Startup Showcase.

“We were just at the idea stage with a 0.5 version of our smart stove knob, which was literally 3D printed at the time,” Iyer told me this week in an interview. “It was an exciting but challenging moment because the concept of retrofitting appliances with smart technology was still so new.”

It was a nascent market back in 2016, with only Inirv and Meld (which Hestan acquired to help build the Hestan Cue platform before the product ever shipped) creating stove smart knobs. At the time it was a side hustle for Iyer and her cofounder, but soon would become her full time focus as she launched a Kickstarter in 2017.

In our conversation, Iyer talked about how the original idea for building a smart stove knob can from personal experience. When her mother, recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s, accidentally started a kitchen fire after leaving the stove on, Iyer realized there wasn’t any smart home technology focused on helping those aging in place. Devices like Nest and Ring were making homes safer, but the kitchen—a critical area where fires often start—had been left out of the equation. Iyer saw an opportunity to create something that could prevent accidents like the one her mother experienced and got to work on building her first MVP.

Like many first-time entrepreneurs, Iyer was soon faced with challenges that can often be insurmountable for those trying to bring a hardware product to market.

“When I started, I thought, ‘How hard could this be?’ It seemed like a straightforward idea—just retrofit a knob to make stoves smarter. But we quickly realized the complexity. It wasn’t just about controlling the burner; we had to create an entire ecosystem with hardware, software, and a seamless customer experience. We had to integrate a motor, sensors, and Wi-Fi, all while ensuring the product was intuitive and safe. Those early days were tough, especially since we bootstrapped the business. It was a side hustle for a long time, and we didn’t fully appreciate how challenging it would be to bring a product like this to market.”

A pivotal moment for the company came in 2018 when Iyer appeared on Shark Tank. She told me that though they received an offer, they ultimately chose not to take the deal, a decision she now views as a blessing in disguise.

“We did get an offer from Robert Herjavec, and to be honest, it wasn’t a bad offer for where we were at the time, having just started with barely a functioning prototype. But we didn’t end up taking it. And I’m glad we didn’t, because at that point, it was still a side hustle. We hadn’t raised any money, didn’t have a team of engineers, and hadn’t figured out how to really build a company.”

It took the company almost four years to finally make good on its award commitments for its Kickstarter, and in 2021, it delivered its first-generation product to backers. Iyer said that first gen product had certain constraints—particularly with compatibility on stoves where the knobs were closer together, which led to some backers not being able to use the product. But the company kept engaged with its backers (as seen on the product’s Kickstarter page), promising to fulfill their needs with the next generation of the product.

And now, with the Ome Smart Knob, the company is both shipping to those backers who couldn’t make the first-gen product work while also selling the product on their website to new customers. Priced at $129, the company is emphasizing its messaging around fire-safety for senior citizens. Iyer sees potential for partnerships with senior living communities and hopes, in the long run, insurance companies could subsidize the purchase of her smart knob through discounts for homeowners who install the device, much like discounts offered for home security systems.

The Ome Smart Knob In Action

It will be interesting to see how much traction Ome gets now that they’ve been able to deliver on the vision Iyer first had back almost a decade ago. One of the key potential hurdles in broader acceptance by insurance companies and smart home ecosystem players to integrate products like the Ome is safety standards, something Iyer is working on as a Technical Committee member for UL Standard 858. UL 858 is a set of safety standards for electric ranges, and the group is working to update and modernize to factor in smart home technologies like those built into the Ome.

“We’re working to update UL 858 to allow for automation in a safe way. The critical thing is maintaining user consent—meaning the user still has to push and turn to activate the stove, and then our technology takes over. We’re in the process of getting certification to show the industry that we can build this technology without putting anyone at risk. The big concern with UL is ensuring no one can remotely turn on a stove, and we’ve built safeguards to prevent that.”

We’ll keep an eye on the progress around UL 858 and how Ome does with the rollout of its new smart knob. If you want to watch my full interview, just click play below.

Ome's Akshita Iyer Talks With The Spoon About The New Smart Stove Knob

CES 2020: Inirv Can Control Your Stove Remotely, and Turn It Off In Case of Fire

CES was full of safety tech, especially focused on home and auto security. But there was also one solution aiming to create a safer kitchen environment.

Inirv React’s first product is a retrofit knob and detector system. The temperature and motion detectors communicate with the IoT-enabled knob and allow you to monitor and adjust stove temperature to prevent you from accidentally burning your dinner — or burning the house down. Inirv was actually part of our 2016 SKS Startup Showcase. As we wrote back then:

The Inirv knobs give you remote control of your burners via the smartphone app so you’ll never burn your food – but the sensor will actually remind you if it senses a lack of motion around the stove for too long and left your food unattended.

Inirv React doesn’t just alert you if there’s something burning at the stove. You can also use it to control your burners remotely, adjusting the heat in accordance with a recipe. You can even set cook times/temperatures via the app and the knobs will automatically adjust to the correct level at the right time.

The Durham, NC-based company was originally planning to ship its smart stove system in 2017 after a successful Kickstarter campaign, but clearly that didn’t happen. They ended up continuing to crowdfund, eventually raising $175K via Kickstarter by the end of 2019.

Past struggles aside, the Inirv team at CES seemed confident that it can hit its new estimated ship date of March 2020. One unit (AKA knob) will cost $99, or you can buy four for $279. An Inirv rep on the CES show floor said that it has already pre-sold 30,000 React units.

This may seem like an overly-intense solution to leaving the stove on, but house fires are a serious business. Cooking fires account for nearly half of all in-home fires. According to the U.S. Fire Administration, from 2014-16, cooking fires led to 195 deaths and $463 million in property loss in the U.S. alone. Smoke alarms can alert you once there’s already a problem, but Inirv claims it has the benefit of preventing an issue before it happens.

Since cooking fires are so common, it’s no surprise that Inirv isn’t the only company trying to get in on stove safety. iGuardStove and Innohome (two more SKS Startup Showcase finalists!) also make devices to turn off stoves and prevent cooking fires. Innohome (sold under the SmartRange brand name in North America) is the more common. Its device is cheaper than Inirv — $199 for four-burner coverage — but it doesn’t have the same nifty heat-control capabilities; it can only shut the stovetop completely off.

Innohome’s products are already shipping and Inirv is still relatively untested, so it’s too soon to say if the latter’s system will a) go to market, and b) work as planned. But it’s safe to say that we’re intrigued by the future of kitchen safety solutions.

Wallflower Adds To Growing List Of Startups Trying To Prevent Kitchen Fires

Kitchen fires are a problem.

According to National Fire Protection Association, almost half of all home fires are caused by cooking equipment. Most of those are due to inattention, either because we get distracted, busy or may be suffering from some age-induced memory issue.

Cooking equipment cause nearly half of all home fires

But here’s the good news: there are a new crop of companies trying to bring modern approaches to kitchen fire prevention. The newest of these companies is Wallflower, which announced their Smart Monitor kitchen fire monitoring product this week.

The Wallflower is slightly different than the other kitchen fire-prevention devices launched over the past couple years in that it’s a lower-cost, alerting-only system. The others, like InnoHome and Inirv, automatically shut-off the stove in addition to alerting the home owner.

Why did Wallflower decide to make an alert-only system? According to company CEO Victor Jablokov, the main reason was to provide a lower-cost device with simple features. He explains their thinking in a Medium post:

“One of the biggest challenges companies face when developing new products is deciding which features to release first. Every feature, no matter how small, must be scrutinized to judge its benefits to the end customer. Smart companies know that must-have features should make it into the first release, and nice-to-have features don’t. Too many companies make the mistake of piling every possible feature on their first product. Usually, that ends up making the product more expensive, more complicated, and more confusing than necessary. The end result? Weak sales.”

According to Jablokov, not having a shut-off feature wasn’t that big a deal with beta testers. He said, almost without exception, everyone who received an alert was close enough to come and shut off their stoves themselves.

This makes sense. To me it’s analogous to a smoke alarm or a DIY home security system, where alerts are intended to get the home owner to take action.

That said, I think many will be willing to pay extra for the a fire prevention device that will shut off their stove, especially those who suffer from mobility issues or just just want an extra layer of prevention.

Below I’ve put together a comparison guide for each of the kitchen fire prevention startups, including Wallflower, InnoHome, IGuardFire and Inirv.

Comparison of products focused on kitchen fire prevention

Inirv Retrofit Kitchen Kickstarter Surpasses Goal

The 2016 Smart Kitchen Summit’s startup showcase was home to many exciting new companies showing off connected and high-tech devices for kitchens of the future.

One of those companies, Inirv, had a safety system designed for stoves that highlighted the importance of retrofit solutions in the smart home. While many are building connectivity and smarts into their ovens, stoves and fridges, the team at Inirv is tackling a common problem with an add-on system. With a wireless sensor that can detect the presence of gas, the absence of motion for prolonged periods of times and smoke coupled with retrofit stove knobs that can control your stove’s burners, Inirv is designed to prevent overcooking and fires from unattended food.

Credit: Inirv

The Inirv knobs give you remote control of your burners via the smartphone app so you’ll never burn your food – but the sensor will actually remind you if it senses a lack of motion around the stove for too long and left your food unattended. The product is designed to be less of a reactive solution (aka smoke alarm goes off because something is burning) and more proactive to prevent your food from turning into a house fire.

Inirv’s Kickstarter ends on Wednesday and backers can be pretty confident they’ll get a product as the campaign is fully-funded and already passed a few of its stretch goals, including adding Amazon Echo functionality. Alexa, turn off the stove! At $229 for four knobs and a sensor, it’s not the cheapest smoke alarm solution on the market, but it is much smarter than most.

The Inirv team plans to ship the product in December, hopefully in time for the holidays.