Well, the wallmount/charging base could be sold separately. That way the price would only go up for use cases where mains power / recharging is required.
True. However the more I think about this, the more I realize that Project BFF’s biggest application isn’t on a wall fixture. There’s a handful of Z-Wave remotes out there, but quite frankly they all suck- the buttons are abstract shapes, or it’s just a big button with more buttons around it, etc etc. A simple, on/off remote has a lot of utility and a lot of WAF.
For example… take our bedroom. My girlfriend is NOT a technical person. I gave her one of these and she knows + and - turn the bedroom light on and off, and the circles are for the sleep sound. Now I want to put a LED strip behind our head board for low level ambient light. I can program her remote for double-taps, but that will confuse her. Or I can take a Project BFF, screw it to the wall or the headboard, and tell her this is the on/off for the headboard light it works just like the other switches.
Or in another room there’s a lamp that shines in your eyes if you’re sitting at the TV. I offered another handheld remote and she had no interest. I could take a Project BFF, bolt it to the wall next to the couch, and say ‘look the annoying dining room light is now a 3-way switch!’. She’d love that.
Or under the kitchen cabinets I’m planning to put LED strip. That’ll have a Z-Wave control module; perhaps a plug-in module connected to a dimmable transformer, perhaps a Z-Wave LED controller, not sure. Either way, if I can just bolt a BFF to the side of the cabinet near where food is prepared, it becomes 10x easier to use.
Would I love BFF to have a rechargeable battery and Qi receiver? Sure. But with a good lithium cell I think it should work just fine as a standalone product. And I think affordability of BFF will be key- it’ll be a way to put a switch where there was no switch before.
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Good point. And by the time BFF comes out, I will have put load-less Red Series switches/dimmers as remotes anywhere I can (i.e., I can make room in a junction box nearby, and get power from some circuit). BFF isn’t going to be saving me from buying (and doing the electrical work for) more switches (or pseudo-switches in wall boxes). BFF is going to be saving me from buying picos (and the Caseta Pro Bridge and all that jazz), and from the issues of the tiny little five buttons on the pico.
What I am currently using that does the job is a simple two-button Zigbee remote from IKEA. But BFF will have the advantage of being Z-Wave (so direct association is possible), and of having a form factor that looks more like a regular light switch (or at least like an Inovelli light switch, since at some point no regular “dumb” switches will remain in my house… 
).
What about the option to power from USB, similar to the multi sensor? People could then provide their own USB power source.
I have been troubleshooting an issue with a red dimmer, and have it setup in a test gang box sitting on my desk. Right now it is temporarily in use as a meeting notification switch. When i press the config button, it turns on a color bulb to red right outside my home office door. it also sets the notification LED to red, so i remember I have it on. Press again and they both turn off. This way the family knows not to disturb when I am in a meeting. A red dimmer seems like overkill for this, but if there were a powered button, so the LED notification could stay on without draining the battery supper fast, that might work.
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So, the idea of a battery operated remote offers some innovative use cases.
However, a slightly spiffed up “even dumber” switch would be preferable to me.
Namely, I have way too many battery operated devices already. Plus, I’ve got “wired” boxes all over the place–having converted my house over to Z-Wave in 2010, I went through the pain of getting hot/neutral/load/ground/traveler wires all in one box–and traveler/neutral (usually neutral) in the 3-way aux box.
I would LOVE the ability to add a “dumb” Inovelli aux-switch that had a full-functioning LED that parrotted the LED function from the primary switch. AND that wasn’t battery powered at all.
Possibly some sort of low-frequency signal passed along the traveler wire to tell the LED what to do? Then, an extremely low power circuit that only drove the LED–so it could actually draw all the power it needed from the “traveler” wire, supplied by the primary switch.
This could be swapped in in place of a GE aux switch and, when paired with an Inovelli Dimmer/Switch, you’d have that super sweet LED at ALL locations.
Also, note: the primary switch should detect and handle all “aux switch” presses identically to those on it’s own paddle/toggle. Thus, double up-tapping the aux switch should result in the same events/behavior as a “double up-tap” on the primary switch itself (e.g., events sent to the hub, z-wave association behavior, etc.).
I just replaced all my old GE/Jasco Z-wave (non-plus) switches with GE/Jasco S2 Enbrighten ones. THEN I found out about your cool stuff.
I’m not planning (currently) to replace all my new switches before the credit card bills from that have even arrived 
– but I am wanting to do a bit of shuffling to add 5-6 of these in key locations. I got a Red Series “switch” yesterday and put it in place. Pretty sweet–I’m stoked about being able to use the colors to distinguish between the various situations I want to know about (e.g., armed away, armed at home, doors open, all doors locked, etc.). Two more dimmers are supposed to arrive tomorrow.
I’ve been looking into doing this with two Red switches for another thread. It works out of box with the HomeSeer 200 series switches, but Inovelli’s currently get into an update loop and flood the network with useless traffic. @EricM_Inovelli suggested a fix using Parameter 12 but I have yet to try it.
While having two Red switches isn’t the cheapest option, it would give you everything you want…
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I do some work in rentals that are turned into smarthomes for a period of a couple years. If I could avoid running wires, I would be a very happy man. Its way easier to patch a couple screw holes, than a bunch of outlet sized holes.
Will this compete directly with GE/Jasco’s Enbrighten z wave remote? It’s very similar to the Caseta Pico remote that it fits in a decora wall plate but is also removable. No wiring required. Just set up associations through your hub.
I hope it doesn’t compete — the GE/Jasco is only usable through Association. It doesn’t send reports for button presses to the hub, which I hope Inovelli’s will, which would make it far more usable for people who do have hubs and what the extra power this opens up.
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Yeah, considering the three years that elapsed since the announcement, those GE remotes are pretty disappointing. They are, technically, secondary controllers (and, so, don’t actually use associations, but control switches directly) - not very useful to folks who want to use their hub as a central point of control.
If the “hub remotes” that were also announced in 2017 make it to market, those would use central scene commands sent back to the hub. It looks like the 2-button version recently made its way through z-wave certification.
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Recently… certified in 2018. I dunno what’s going on over at GE/Jasco and why it’s taking 3 years to get to market, but they are missing the boat. Product looks promising though- single/double/triple tap and hold/release. I’d buy one (would much prefer a BFF though 
)
Any news or ETA for this product? I’ve been having issues with consistency using an aux with red dimmer switch and this seems like it would solve my problems.
No update yet – at this point, it seems like the only way this will come to fruition soon is to pay off our outstanding debt to the manufacturer and that will come via an investment. It’s close and we’re negotiating on both fronts (ie: working with the manufacturer to allow us to innovate and working with potential investors to give us a decent deal lol).
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You are awesome, thank you for posting an update to the community. I would bet someone in the community has some kick ass video editing skills and would be willing to make you an investor pitch video 
I will hold out for these BFFs. They sound AMAZING.
Hey Eric, I have some experience with fundraising etc. Happy to get on DMs or emails to see if I can help. (not trying to sell my services; just happy to help).
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Have you thought about crowdfunding? Kickstarter/Indigogo are perfect for these types of projects and would allow you to avoid taking on debt. It also functions as free advertising for the company. win/win
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I know I’m coming in late to this thread, but I just got my first Inovellis a few weeks ago (Feb. 2021) and just discovered this. I would vote for a full length LED like the Red Dimmer with Scene control, LZW31-SN, except the would only come on when the up/down or config button was pushed and then only stay on for a configurable amount of time or if programmed to accept notifications.
Also, I’m sure you’ve seen that the Pico has a wall mount and a stand mount so it can look just like a regular switch or sit on a table, night stand etc., and be a handy remote. Those would be particularly great in a bedroom where you don’t want to talk out loud to Alexa/Google or get out of bed to push a physical button to turn off the lights or adjust the fan speed (assuming one has your light and/or fan+light switch).
Stuart
Any new updates on this?
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No. I will let you know when the time comes, I promise.
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Looking forward to this, especially with inductive charge idea.
Currently went with the zooz version to control a light that I can’t easily rewire.
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