Ep93-Why Low-Voltage Is the Future of Smart Buildings (with Matt Laherty of Cinch IoT)

What if powering an intelligent building was as simple as running speaker wire?

In the 93rd episode of Simply Business, host John Jennings sits down with Matt Laherty of Cinch IoT, a company building a two-wire, low-voltage intelligent building platform that powers and connects lighting, sensors, air quality monitoring, people counting, and more — all over a simple, safe cable.

Matt shares his unconventional path from a history degree and tech recruiting, to Cisco, where he worked on service provider routing and became one of the early leaders behind Power over Ethernet and Cisco’s digital ceiling initiatives. That journey ultimately led him to ask a big question: If all these networks end up in buildings, why are we still using complicated, high-voltage infrastructure to power them?

Together, John and Matt dig into:

How Cinch IoT uses a low-voltage, two-wire platform to dramatically simplify smart building design and installation.

Why simplicity, safety, and lower total cost beat “cool but complicated” when it comes to real-world adoption.

The realities of building and scaling hardware: designing boards, managing supply chains, and preparing for big orders.

Go-to-market lessons for selling disruptive tech into a traditional electrical and construction ecosystem.

New applications like continuous thermal monitoring in data centers, and why overheating and power cycling are such big risks.