Friends follow a dream, launch ‘intelligent doorbell’

By ARSELIA GALES
Staff Writer

SMU graduates Nezare Chafni (left) and Shaun Moore

When Shaun Moore and Nezare Chafni graduated from the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University in 2010, the two friends had no idea what the future had in store for them.

Moore, 25, and Chafni, 26, always dreamed of starting their own business but instead went a different route after graduation. Moore, a Chicago native, got a job at Merrill Lynch, and Chafni moved back to Morocco, where at age 24 he became the youngest candidate for Parliament.

But finance and politics couldn’t satisfy their entrepreneurial spirits. Just two years later, the friends reunited and launched 214 Technologies, in March 2013.

Moore and Chafni both agreed that Dallas was a great place to launch their business, noting that the city is becoming a hub for startups.

“We decided to follow our dream of becoming entrepreneurs, and because of that, we got the freedom to work for ourselves and be creative,” said Moore.

Chafni is in charge of product development for 214 Technologies. Moore handles business development.

Through 214 Technologies, the two launched Chui, an “intelligent doorbell” that uses facial recognition technology to improve home security.

Facial recognition is used in a variety of markets, including law enforcement. Some smartphones, such as the Samsung Galaxy, use facial recognition so users can unlock their phones. Facebook uses the technology to suggest tags for photos.

Chui, named after the Swahili word for leopard, is a Wi-Fi-enabled device that lets homeowners know who is at their door.

Ringing the doorbell activates a camera that takes a picture of visitors and sends it to the homeowner’s cellphone with a time stamp, name and picture. The photos Chui takes are added to a Web application that houses a database of visitors.

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