Working with your existing AV partner on AI integration
We don't replace your AV firm. We work alongside them. Here's how we typically scope and split the work.
Most of the homes we work in already have an AV partner — sometimes a national firm, sometimes a small local integrator. They installed the Lutron, the Crestron, the speakers, the cameras. They know the home in a way nobody else does. We are not coming in to replace them.
We come in as the AI specialist. The AV firm owns the hardware layer and the integration of the devices themselves. We own the intelligence layer — the orchestration, the voice and ambient AI, the privacy architecture, the long-term tuning. The two layers depend on each other but they're genuinely different practices, and trying to do both with a single firm usually means one of them gets done badly.
On a typical estate engagement, the scope split looks like this. The AV firm has already (or will) install and configure the lighting, climate, audio, shading, and security hardware. They handle the network, the racks, the wiring. They keep doing the maintenance and warranty work on the hardware they installed. They are the homeowner's first call when a device breaks.
We sit on top of that. We design the orchestration logic, the AI behaviors, the voice interactions, and the data architecture. We integrate with the AV firm's chosen platform (Crestron Home, Lutron Athena, KNX, Home Assistant, vendor APIs). We are the homeowner's call when the home behaves in an unexpected way, or when they want it to behave differently. We are not the call when a switch dies.
The billing arrangements vary. Sometimes we bill directly. Sometimes we sub through the AV firm. Sometimes we run a joint quote with explicit scope. We are flexible about it because the goal is the homeowner being well served, not us being the principal contractor on every job.
If you're an AV firm reading this and you have an estate client asking for AI capabilities you don't currently offer — we're happy to talk. We've quietly partnered with a couple of Vegas AV firms in this shape. It's a clean arrangement.