Solution to Coffee-time Challenge

. Apart from developing a number of consumer products, he has the distinction of surviving the Dragon’s Den, which offered him £150,000 for 40% of his ‘Binvelope’, currently being piloted by Brighton and Hove City Council. This idea he has called the ‘Loominate’. It consists of a small LED torch with a passive infrared sensor that replaces the pull weight on the end of a bathroom pull cord. He told Eureka at the recent British Invention Show how exactly he came up with the idea. “I have to get on the Internet early in the morning to get in touch with my business partner in China” he explained. However, the brightness of the bathroom light, the noise of the switch and the bathroom fan coming on all served to wake his partner. By contrast, the Loominate, powered by four AAA batteries, lights up four LEDs when it detects somebody in the room. It can then either be used as the source of light in the bathroom or allow the main light to be turned on by pulling it, whereupon the LEDs go out, saving battery life. “It’s not just a pull cord light, it’s an emergency light,” points out Capon, “Everybody knows where the bathroom is. There’s a quick release and you can use it as a torch.” And, attached to an emergency pull cord in a house equipped for the elderly or disabled, it could even save a life.