‘Smart Oven’ Idea Cooked Up in Chattanooga
Published Apr 07, 2006
Smart Ovens
Imagine sitting in your office, your car or even the dentist’s chair and using your cell phone to turn on your oven to cook dinner. Twenty years ago, this idea would have seemed impossible, but today, ovens are becoming quite clever, and they’re getting their smarts right here in Tennessee.
TMIO – which stands for Tonight’s Menu Intelligent Ovens – launched its appliance design and engineering operations in Chattanooga in August 2004. Since then, it’s been making some very smart ovens – appliances that can be controlled remotely by a wireless device, such as a cell phone.
The Connect Intelligent Oven is not only an oven, but also a refrigerator. By placing a prepared meal in the oven before leaving home, the appliance can also keep it cold until ready to cook.
“Dinners placed in the refrigerated appliance before the consumer goes to work are done by the time he or she arrives home,” says TMIO President and Chief Executive Officer David Mansbery.
“If plans change, there’s no problem. Using their cellular phone or logging on to the Internet, they can delay the cook time, change the cook temperature, refrigerate after cooking, set a warming mode or cancel the cook cycle altogether.”
According to TMIO research, the Connect Intelligent Oven can reduce meal preparation time by up to 33 percent – giving the cook more time for family and friends.
According to Mansbery, the Cleveland, Ohio-based company decided to locate engineering operations in Chattanooga due to the area’s long association with the manufacture of cooking appliances, specifically wall ovens.
“The community offers a well-trained workforce in this industry that we needed to bring our product to market,” Mansberry says.
Trevor Hamilton, vice president of economic development for the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce, says “TMIO represents the kind of high-tech manufacturing company that is one of our primary recruitment targets – one that plays to the strength of our manufacturing heritage, coupled with exciting new technologies.”
TMIO Intelligent Ovens have received an enormous amount of attention from the media, including being featured on CNBC’s “Power Lunch,” ABC’s “Good Morning, America” and HGTV. The patented TMIO Internet-controlled refrigerated oven recently won the Reader’s Digest 2006 “Best of America” award.
Story by Maury Rich
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