New key to success

Nuki Home Solutions was founded in 2014 in Graz as an innovative start-up. How exactly did you come up with the idea of a door lock that works without a key?

Martin Pansy, founder and CEO of Nuki Home Solutions: The idea behind our Smart Lock arose in response to a real everyday problem: the set of keys in your pocket often scratches your smartphone’s screen. On top of that, we’re all familiar with the problem of losing or forgetting our keys. At the same time, more and more services are being delivered on or by our phones, so it was clear to us that there must be a better, more innovative and, most importantly, mobile solution.

Since 2016, Nuki has been relying on logistics solutions by cargo-partner. What were the major challenges in the beginning, and how have the demands towards your logistics partner changed over the course of time?

In the beginning, as a young company, we mainly struggled with a lack of prior knowledge and experience with logistical processes. Thus, the initial setup of processes – transport from our suppliers to the central cargo-partner warehouse, delivery of the goods from there to our customers in more than 100 countries – was a big challenge. A further complicating factor was the fact that especially in the beginning, demand for our products was very volatile and highly dependent on certain marketing campaigns. This led to a strong need for capacities during peak times, coupled with a rather unpredictable demand. With quickly growing sales figures, our requirements shifted towards stability and efficiency. In order to reach maximum efficiency, we connected our ERP and our shop system directly with cargo-partner’s systems via data interfaces. At this point, this is the only way to guarantee timely processing of all customer orders.

Nuki works closely with local companies in its target markets to better understand specific local demands. Do these differences have a discernible effect on product requirements?

Doors and especially door locks in Europe are very diverse – just like the users behind them. We engage very closely with the needs voiced by our customer communities and we provide opportunities to modify our product to meet individual requirements. A lot of things can be set up and adjusted by the user with the Nuki App. This enables us to react very flexibly to regional differences in requirements and desires. We’ve also adapted our core product, the Nuki Smart Lock, to local requirements. Here in Austria, for example, the Euro profile cylinder is very common. In countries such as Switzerland or the UK, other cylinder types prevail. Since our Smart Lock is installed directly on the inside of the door, over the existing cylinder lock, regionally adapted mounting plates are required for installation. The Nuki Bridge is plugged into an outlet near the Smart Lock and connects it to the Internet. This also requires adaptations to local circumstances.

As of last year, Nuki has been collaborating with the vacation rental website Airbnb. Seamless integration between the two platforms provides hosts a way to give guests keyless entry via code. How did this collaboration come about and are similar projects planned, for example with hotels?

Managing keys and the sharing of keys is a big challenge particularly in the short-term rental sector – for guests, but also for hosts. That is why Nuki is a perfect solution for customers and users of Airbnb. Thanks to a digital and fully automated invitation process combined with the Nuki Smart Lock, there is no need to physically hand over keys. We are already actively collaborating with a number of international players in the industry and see enormous future potential in this business area.

Since 2018 Nuki has also collaborated with the Irish company Allegion, which is active in security technology. What’s the story behind that collaboration and what is Nuki hoping to get out of it?

Allegion PLC is one of the world’s leading providers of solutions for secure physical access. With internationally recognized brands like Schlage, CISA and SimonsVoss and a sole focus on around-the-clock security, Allegion recently generated annual revenue of over two billion euros through its provision of secure means of access for private households, companies, schools and other institutions worldwide. For Nuki, a partnership with this global player is a further milestone in its rapid corporate development. Allegion is the ideal partner, one that brings global market strength and a growing presence in Europe to the table. That is the ideal context for taking another step closer to our vision of providing keyless, smart access.

In what markets is demand for Nuki’s products growing fastest, and what markets do you intend to conquer next?

We see ourselves as a “born global” company and right from the start, Austria was never our only target market. At the moment, we are focused on Europe and are registering strong growth especially in the German-speaking region, in Benelux, France, the UK, Spain and Italy. We will soon start in Australia and New Zealand as well and are looking forward to conquering new markets with our smart access systems.

A series of innovations have appeared in the past several years related to the "Smart Home". The Nuki Smart Lock 2.0 is compatible with standard Smart Home Systems and can be operated using Amazon Alexa, Google Home or Apple Home Kit. Can you imagine that Nuki will someday expand beyond door locks to include other products in its portfolio?

The Smart Home is one of the key trends of 2019 that is sure to be with us for some time yet. Solutions and possibilities will become ever more diverse – which ends up making things more complex for users. It is incredibly important to us that we provide an open and integrative solution. That is evident too in the diverse possibilities for integration in a variety of Smart Home Systems. We have set ourselves the goal of making existing access management solutions more intelligent and replacing the physical key. With literally millions of doors, our core markets continue to offer great potential for growth.

Thank you for the interview!