It's a solved problem. The physics is simply such that it's really inefficient.
> ... we'd need a system 12.5 times bigger, i.e., roughly 531 square metres, or about 2.6 times the size of the relevant solar array. This is now going to be a very large satellite, dwarfing the ISS in area, all for the equivalent of three standard server racks on Earth.
The gist of it is that about 99% of cooling on earth works by cold air molecules (or water) bumping into hot ones, and transferring heat. There's no air in space, so you need a radiator 99x larger than you would down here. That adds up real fast.
> > How are you going to build your service network?
> Compensate the contractors fairly and act as lead gen.
I used to work at a company which makes security and access control systems (swipe cards, electronic locks, etc).
They created a consumer-level system (as opposed to the big Enterprise ones they were known for) and tried to create a distribution model which appears to be how you're thinking about it. The idea was they'd build a network of contractors ("Installers"). Customers would buy direct from the company, who would then forward a request to your local installer (lead gen). The company would cut the installers in for some percentage of the ongoing subscription revenue cost, plus whatever margin they added at install time.
This failed miserably. The company learned within the space of a couple of years, that all the good installers want to build a relationship with (and critically, to bill) the customer, they don't want to be a behind-the-scenes referral on someone else's website.
Few signed up, and the ones that did, weren't incentivized to prioritize it highly. They put it lower down on their job lists, which led to customers having to wait a long time and experiencing poor service in some cases. Not great.
The company also struggled tremendously to drum up interest. Because security systems (like HVAC) come with maintenance/repairs/etc, the market had evolved into one centered around companies/individuals looking around at their local providers first, picking the "best" one, and then choosing a product based on what the provider was offering or what they recommended, much like you would with a Plumber or Electrician.
Maybe the HVAC industry is sufficiently different from Security and this model might work for you? From what I saw though, there's a lot of overlap there and I'm not optimistic.
After a year or two, the company pivoted to a model where they formed partnerships with contractors/installers and moved away from the direct-to-consumer model. At the time I left, this was proving much more successful of a model. The partnership model involved more revenue share, training, and a bunch of other stuff I wasn't involved in, but critically, it meant that when an end-customer went to their local security system provider and asked them what was good, they'd be highly likely to recommend my ex-company's product. That was the clincher.
> Better air quality is achieved through a thermostat with PM2.5 and CO2 sensors, as well as an air quality module on the air handler that controls HEPA filtration, fresh air intake and modification of the home’s humidity
This is very nice, but in the grand scheme of things nobody cares about these. They just want a warm house in winter and a cool one in summer.
If air quality/filtering were a free/cheap addon that'd be great, but not if it means the unit costs significantly more.
OTOH, that gives you a very nice market segmentation mechanic. Provide a lower-cost unit without things like CO2 sensors and HEPA filters, and charge a fat margin to upgrade to the fancy one for those richer people who have the luxury of such things.
Speaking here from New Zealand, where central heating/thermostats are basically unheard of, outside of offices and schools. Heatpumps are very common in homes, usually high-wall mounted ones like this:
We have the approx 12 year old variant of the above heatpump in our current house, and in our previous house paid to install a similar thing.
The hardware cost for one of those is $2900 NZD, plus another few for install, leading to a total cost of around $5000-6000 NZD ($3000 - $3700) USD approx. While that is still a fair chunk of change, it's less than a quarter of the cost of the $14,000 USD that Electric Air is launching with.
It's not ideal, you end up with a single climate controlled part of your house, and the rest relies on leaving the doors open. The fully ducted electric air system (which I assume lets you heat/cool individual rooms) would certainly be a lot nicer, but the massive price differential means that only the really super rich elite level houses would ever install one. The other 99% of the market is happy with the "good enough" solution of a wall-mounted heatpump.
One other thing - Water drainage from a heatpump in cooling mode is a common problem. Installers need to run pipes out through walls to drain away condensed water, and while they ideally can use gravity, sometimes install location means a water pump is required. We have one of those; some years ago the pump failed leading to a lot of soaked carpet in our living room. Hopefully electric air has a good reliable solution there!
Finally: When installing heatpumps, this requires the indoor unit (source of cold/hot air) to be connected via heatpipe to the outdoor unit. This almost always involves drilling holes through interior and exterior walls (often brick). Because of the potential for things to go wrong, I'd never recommend a DIY / home contractor to install such a thing. You want a reputable company that warranties their work, has something at stake, and that you can have recourse against, if they screw it up.