SPEAKER_02 0:00

Mark Zuckerberg and Med are building a data centre that's gonna have as much annual energy consumption as New Zealand. Why would I bother optimising my system? If all of mobility was fully clean, that would still not be as much of an impact as you could have just focused on introduction property.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Hi Stefan and welcome to the podcast. Thanks for coming on. It'd be great to hear about who you are and um why you do what you do, please.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

Thanks for having me, James. Very nice to um very nice to be here. Um I suppose a little bit about myself. So I started my life working in big tech. Um I worked at Microsoft for a little bit in the kind of media and marketing side. I had uh a bit of a millennial epiphany that that wasn't a positive contribution to the world, trying to get people to buy more Doritos and BA flights and um you know dog food or whatever it was. So I went and did a sustainability degree for my master's up in Edinburgh and kind of landed sideways in building energy performance engineering. So I worked at a company called Hawley, um, mechanical electrical consultancy, full of some very, very intelligent engineers that are involved in some amazing projects. And I basically learnt building engineering on the job, you know, mechanical, electrical systems, um, and realized at that very early stage as well that there are a lot of challenges around accessing building data to try and drive those energy efficiency improvements. Um, sort of stepped out of that world a little bit sideways uh briefly and went into sort of broader smart buildings. I worked with the intelligent buildings team at Hawley, was very lucky to be part of a lot of landmark early projects back in kind of 2015, 2016. You know, the Deloitte offices are still touted as some of the big smart buildings examples in the world, you know, flying over to help Quadrill, doing Google's smart building strategy. Um, and then kind of shifted gears and went and worked client side, I worked at HP Revis, the Symbiosy solution, um, and then at Wired Score, writing the SmartScore uh framework in my initial role before having sort of various product and innovation roles uh in the business there.

SPEAKER_00 1:58

And you've ended up founding meters.

SPEAKER_02 2:01

Yeah, so perhaps most importantly is uh is that, yeah, now now co-founded, meeters, I should say, um, which is all focused on removing uh barriers to collecting and analyzing building energy data. So we're uh hardware focused and providing an energy data infrastructure layer for commercial real estate to underpin sustainability reporting, energy efficiency, uh even things like tenant recharge, uh and really just trying to mobilize the decarbonisation of the built environment through that that kind of enablement layer.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

Aaron Ross Powell You said you had an epiphany and you went and did car was it carbon management at university? Yes. What were you doing before? What was it always a passion, or was it really just the epiphany that you wanted to move into something completely different?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Yeah, I think um marketing always interested me because the psychology behind it. You know, and uh we had um one of my modules that I really enjoyed um when I was when I was younger, doing my marketing degree was all about consumer behavior and sort of how people are brought to into certain things, you know, colours, branding, all those types of topics. I realized quite quickly that working in that world, there was there's not much of a clean canvas or a clean slate. You always have kind of limitations and barriers around your creativity, you know, what you can and can't do. And it also wasn't fact-based enough for me. And I simultaneously had this urge or this desire to try and have a bit more of a positive impact, which I think is the vanilla millennial in me. Um, not that that's a bad thing necessarily, but you know, good good to have that mindset. And and that just kind of then somehow dragged me into the world of buildings. And I mean, you you see that statistic thrown around quite often about the 40% of global emissions, right? I think commercial it's 13% the last one that I saw. Um so there's there's a real opportunity to make a big impact, yeah. And then it's an industry which has been slow to evolve. Um, so there's there's kind of the a double opportunity, if you like, on that basis.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

Yeah, which I think brings us on really nicely into the evolving and the slow process, which often gets started around with uh commercial real estate as well. And how have you found that in terms of I think it'd probably be interesting to hear your viewpoint from your history and not just uh meters in terms of how you've gone about innovation and change and some of the barriers which you maybe have faced as trying to implement those uh changes in industry which is historically uh and famously known for being a little bit slow to want to change. It is it is funny, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 4:26

There's that um I think I can't remember what it's BCG or McKinsey, but they do that industry digitization index. I don't know if you've seen it.

SPEAKER_00 4:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:34

Um and they categorize you know different kinds of industries in terms of the level of digitization. And and the last one that I saw it had uh real estate came out, or construction of real estate, to be fair, came out uh second to bottom above agriculture and hunting um in the index, which which kind of says it all, right? Um but no, it's it it's I mean it's been an interesting journey. I I do feel that I was fortunate, you know, now in my what 13 or 14 years working in this space. I was fortunate to be kind of at the at the genesis of of that kind of tech innovation that was happening and some of those first projects. And you know, when I first started and I was working on the energy performance side, it was just all really old school. It was you know siloed control systems inside, you know, these buildings and people trying to interact with them in a the way that they always had done, you know, and kind of we were operating in in sort of an old school way. And I mean you say it's old school, it's not not really that old school, it's still very current. Um but our big customers when we were uh or clients when we were when I was working at Horley and the energy performance group were mainly big um big universities. So in and in particular Oxford University. So we we did a lot of work with with Oxford University back then, um, focused on on trying to reduce the the carbon intensity of their estate. Um and and I think they were being the forward-thinking you know institution that they are, they were kind of ahead of the curve, perhaps, a lot of those topics, but their systems just weren't went up to scratch through no fault of theirs or any of the companies that were that were working there, they just hadn't really evolved into that that digital age, you know. So I was as a as a graduate horly, I was rocking, walking around, you know, taking manual meter readings, you know, staring at ceilings and plant rooms, which is great for your for your posture when you're kind of walking around following pipes all day. Um, and just trying to trying to understand what was going on. I mean, the the lab buildings were the main ones that were the real energy consumers. You know, they all had these kind of gradients for pressure that they had to maintain, and they had quite a few pathogen labs at uh at Oxford that were from a health perspective quite critical that they were operating properly. Um we had to work with. And I think I think funnily talking about about barriers to change, we had some really interesting interactions there with some of the scientists or the professors as well, who were very, very particular about how their building was going to run because ultimately it impacted their research. Yeah. Right? You know, there's there were control variables around temperature, humidity, and things like that. We had one, I'll never forget one um one scientist who was working on um mind controlling flies with with beams of light. So he was his all of his experiments were about trying to shoot these rays of light at different frequencies at these flies so they would change direction in the air. And it was meant to be this kind of early research around mind control, you know, planet of the apes kind of stuff, really, for animal. And and this guy was just it was one of the creepiest interactions I've ever had. Because I remember walking up into his office and it was just completely sterile. Everything was, you know, it looked like the pen on his desk had been measured out by a ruler in terms of how far it was from the next one. And he was super resistant, right? You know, didn't want us to do anything that could potentially jeopardize his his fly population that he'd been, you know, his fruit fly population he'd been breeding for years under under certain temperature conditions. So it's I mean it's a whole range of things really. Uh even back then it was it was the systems, it was the people, you know, it's it's uh it's difficult to make change happen, I think, in in this space.

SPEAKER_00 7:49

And then moving into the wild score. When did you join Wild Score in its in its evolution? Was it quite early on? And then that obviously moved forward and headed into the smart buildings world as well, quite heavily as well.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

Yeah, so I I joined right when they when they kind of moved into the smart building side. So it was shortly after they raised their Series A, I believe it was. Um, and they'd been done, you know, they'd done really well on the connectivity side, and Wired Score had a really good product market fit for its for its core Wired Score solution. It came out of New York. I won't spend too much time on the history, but came out of New York to try and you know drive an understanding of of which buildings could offer that connectivity to modern companies and then and then shifted over and is now a global, the global brand that's that's well recognized. Um and and I was kind of brought in right after they'd launched and written the first version of the smart score scorecard. Okay. Um then I was one of the I would say the specialists that that came on board, you know, the the the people who were working on the scorecard before had done lots of great research, but they weren't necessarily from that background. So, you know, I kind of came in and I gave it a pretty strong revamp right at the start. But I really enjoyed that that time working with Sanja in particular, um, who's who's at a researcher uh not director of research at WiredScore, um, because it just gave me such a broad exposure to the different kinds of ways that people were thinking about it. You know, there were so many meetings with different real estate organizations, asked them about their strategies, what they were implementing, why, you know, and then trying to kind of collate that into a messy framework, um, you know, a mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive framework that that could then be used ultimately to arbiter success in in deploying these technologies. And it just seemed like such a great way to try and like have an impact by giving people a North Star. I think building certifications are a bit marmite. Some people love them, some people hate them. Um, but they do they do have an impact to drive change. I mean, I think you know, BREAM's a great example that BREAM's not perfect, but I think there's a heck of a lot more sustainable buildings out there now because of BREAM than the than there would have been otherwise.

SPEAKER_00 9:48

Yeah, completely agree. Although, yeah, I think I'm in that half-half campus, like it's it's great to have them, but what we want is actual change and actual impact. So kind of needing my view is always kind of like like both. No, that's really interesting. And then so then from that you set up meters. Do you want to just explain kind of the problem uh that you're trying to solve with meters and and and why?

SPEAKER_02 10:15

I think I have to to to really explain it, I have to kind of start quite high level, which is that I'm a firm believer in this idea that the that that technology or or prop tech, which is not a phrase that I love, but that prop tech is for the few, not the many at the moment. Um there's a real challenge in in the industry around there being a real huge saturation of solutions really that aim at the very top end of the market, because really only the top end of the market can afford them. You know, there are not many buildings out there that can pay 20, 30, 40,000 pounds a year for a software subscription and fit that into their service charge, or you know, depending on how that that that building or or asset is structured, you know, fit that into the budget elsewhere. And unfortunately, that you know, top 1%, which actually a lot of the decarbonisation solutions are aimed at, represents the the smallest opportunity for driving change in in the industry to actually decarbonize it. And you know, the real problem is in the long tail. Long tail buildings, kind of the regional, call them grade B, grade C. I've not found a sexy marketing term for for kind of not so nice assets that are out there, but that's that's really where the potential is, and that's where we need to need to be targeting. And unfortunately, I just felt like there was no real solutions out there that were that were going to support those buildings. And ultimately, what those buildings needed wasn't that complicated anyways. You know, they needed a decent set of information and then and then you know a pair of eyes on that information to make decisions. And I saw very quickly that the pair of eyes exists. You know, the most asset managers, you know, property management companies, they all have great experts, you know, and if and if they don't, they have consultants or or other people they can speak to or engage with to that have that knowledge, you know, to drive off the back of the data. But the the data was still the bottleneck, you know, still the problem. And it's and it's really pronounced, not only in the UK, but all around the world, that people are really struggling to access the information that they need from their buildings to make decarbonisation decisions, which is ultimately uh a public market failure, in my opinion. It's it's it's a failure of the of the smart meter rollout, which has been promised for a long time, but for various reasons, has has failed.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

If you look at in that worldwide view, there's there's probably one market which is I think doing it right, or trying to least do it right, which has been France. Yeah. Um they seem to be the standout in terms of democratising uh energy data, and that's really what meters is all about, isn't it? I think in a in a world where it's not it's not a public accessible data, which the UK certainly isn't.

SPEAKER_02 12:50

And you know what, the U the the UK is actually not that bad. I think the the last statistics I saw from Officer were that something like 56% of of commercial properties now have smart meters. Um, you know, the the the MOPS or the DCC is is required to release that data. It's available on on Electrolink, you know, or like a purse or an Arbonco, you know, whatever kind of solution that you're you're using to scrape that utility utility bill data. The data that's on there is still imperfect. There's some challenges around matching your actual media number, your M PAN to the address that you're dealing with and doing that properly, especially when you don't have the serial number, doing an address lookup can be confusing because the database is a little bit jumbled, you know, there's quite a lot of estimate on consumption in there. But it is getting people that that first snapshot, you know, that that first set of available data. I think for us it's it's about now taking that next step. You know, as much as we do that total building consumption is how are we going to go out and get truly accurate granular information in all these buildings that people can do things. You know, we work with a lot of companies that do renewable sizing. Very hard to do that, you know, if you if you don't have a proper load profile on a building. We work with companies that are trying to understand their their scope one and scope three emissions. So going behind the meter and understanding well, what's actually the building, the landlord's consumption, or what's the tenant's consumption. So there's a lot of more work to be done even beyond the utility smart meter rollout. But even that first step hasn't been hasn't been accomplished. And we're and we're just trying to create a solution to that problem that work that can work quickly and now. Because I think speed is of the essence as well with all the regulations and um and and frankly, climate change is I think it's hard, hard not to look at some of the weather patterns these days and think, oh, just you know, not good. Um it it just need it just needs to go and it needs to move, and I think that's why we're determined, you know, TASS and I in particular to try and and make that make that happen.

SPEAKER_00 14:41

Yeah, I think um relying on government, etc., to to legislate and move isn't isn't going to be the way. We've we've got to have industry leaders like yourselves and like the owners who are moving the dial to actually implement their own their own changes and actually push forward the agenda themselves and hopefully then government can catch up in in due course, I guess. That's really interesting, and I think when you're talking about that that data and going behind the curtain a little bit in in terms of that first step, I think that brings us on quite nicely to a problem which is in the industry, which is the landlord tenant relationship and how you're going about that process because historically landlord tenant has been quite adversary, I'd say, and the sharing of data seems very uh a very weird concept in that relationship. And how are you getting around that? Are you finding that a big problem, especially on buildings where the landlord might have an interest but uh the ownership of the building but the tenant has full control of it, has the actual metering underneath their their control?

SPEAKER_02 15:54

It's tricky. I think this is the short answer there and and it really it really varies. I mean, we I don't even know, I don't even know where to start. I mean, I I suppose for for for everyone who who isn't close to this process or or doesn't necessarily understand how it works, typically if you are trying to access a tenant's data in a building, and that tenant manages the procurement of their own energy and is therefore the owner of that data, then you need to go through what's called a letter of authority process to access that information, which it should be quite straightforward. It's a document that the tenant signs and gives you as a third party, whether or not you know that's a consultant or it's a software company or a property manager, whoever it is, permission to access their energy data, their information. Now, if they're not managing that, if they're not procuring that energy data, and this is already where it starts to get great, because there's not a lot of legislation or clear rules about this stuff, but the the industry standard seems to be if they're not managing that data, i.e., if they're in a tenant recharge environment, so if you have a business path with one main incoming meter, and then you have, call it, 10 industrial sheds, and you have, as the landlord, ownership of those meters and are trying to recharge your tenants on those meters, you as the landlord have legitimate interest in the data because you're trying to recharge and therefore do not need to request that authority off the back of it. Now, if you're not in that situation, if they have their own meters, which for example, and when we go to Switzerland or to Germany, do projects there, it's always, they always have their own meter and they always procure it and manage it individually, then you have to go through that process. And it creates a lot of bottlenecks and challenges. And I mean, it's it's a huge topic. We're part of various lobbying groups that are having these conversations, you know, energy transformation, speaking to the government, trying to drive forward an understanding of how this works. But but ultimately, people are still getting into a into a lot of hot water with it because it's it is confusing and there and there's no clear guideline. And simultaneously, as we mentioned before, you have that kind of that pressure from above from you know from the regulators, and and I think that that desire to do more, which which is pushing against that that that bottleneck and creating creating friction ultimately. I mean, there's um some tenants as well, they just they just don't want to share data at all. You know, I think some of the tech companies in particular are quite resistant. We recently started working with um with Gowling, um, who have been brilliant. Uh they're providing us pro bono legal support as a uh as part of a kind of uh venture program um for kind of sustainability-related startups. Awesome team, really intelligent people. And they're really interesting speaking with their real estate legal team because they're saying, well, actually, we completely get your side of the story, which is you know, you're trying to drive forward this agenda, but we also understand that they represent a lot of tenants and and large multinational tech companies in particular who are saying, well, we don't want to share the data because we see the value in it, right? And you just it's this weird standoff at the moment, and it and it's and it's not helped by the potential, I think, litigation side, right? Because I mean we we do lots of projects as well where where recharge is a topic and meters aren't just what just aren't working correctly, you know, and then and then you end up in a hot fuss. The amount of projects that we've gone into, or we've integrated with an existing metering system, or placed check meters, and then found out that the existing meter that was there hasn't been working properly for mystery number of years, you know, that's a can of worms for for for that landlord to open up. So it's really difficult when you have these, I suppose, challenges or or or or obvious uh issues on the way that you that you know you're gonna face when you really start opening opening the door to all the information you're building. Because as you're saying, that tenant-landlord relationship is ultimately a a a structured contractual relationship, and and and if people feel like they're being short-sold or something, or if something's wrong, then they're then they're quite likely to take that forward in a kind of a legal way.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

Really, it's unfortunate. It's a it's a huge miss in the industry, and there's something which has has to change. I think there has to be some way of changing that relationship to allow allow that data share. And I think for you, why do you see energy data being so important? Obviously, I think I've got an idea from your carbon management background, but I think it'd be really interesting to hear your thought on that.

SPEAKER_02 20:00

It's it's interesting just just on the on the data point before we move on. There's there's a lot of talk about trying to turn it into this open banking model, right? So you almost do where you can run a credit check on someone, you can run an energy data check. Um I think there's a lot of legitimacy behind the concept because there's I mean ultimately energy data underpins a lot of financial products, you know, these days. People have green leases, people have green finance that they're trying to access, you know, their kind of rating from an investor perspective is is based on their on their energy performance or or on their carbon performance. So it really does make sense that that we push towards that that kind of angle, but the the privacy side is what's what's pushing against it. You know, we're talking about commercial, and I think the argument from my point of view, the argument that energy data for a commercial entity is commercially sensitive, is a difficult one to defend. Um I don't necessarily think how you're going to lose any competitive advantage or or or anything is going to be different. Maybe some of the AI companies are that are building the latest models disagree. You know, they don't want anyone to know how much the data center is consuming, so they don't know how efficient it is. I don't I don't know what's out there. But the you know, we haven't even spoken about the residential side, and I think that's actually where a lot of the issues, the regulatory issues are coming from is that those two things are being treated as one and the same. And I think it's I think it's a valid thing to say that someone's energy consumption at home, where they pay for that energy data, is their personal data. It's part of their personal information set, and it makes it, you know, it's personally identifiable because it's linked to an address, ultimately, and that they should have control over that. But because the the serial number, the M-PAN, the structure for energy metering and and data collection is no different in a residential environment to how it is in a commercial environment, it all kind of gets thrown into the same pot. And that's where a lot of those challenges come from.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

Yeah. And do you think there's when I've spoken to in particular, probably actually large retailers as well, I get the feeling that there's nervousness about sharing that data because their own reporting, their own to their investors, etc., is reporting that energy data is really important for them as part of. And they want to have control of that and they want to make sure that they're the ones reporting it and people can't find out that information in terms of that and maybe looking after that data a little bit. Yeah. That overall, if you've if you've got a portfolio of X number of buildings and you can't you can only get 50% or X percentage, how are you able to then really verify that to your own investors?

SPEAKER_03 22:22

Yeah. No, and it's and it and it's so it's it it's there's just this it's fear.

SPEAKER_02 22:26

I ultimately think it's fear. You know, that especially for the people who are maybe not as as close to tech, they they they've had it drilled into them that data is now this this really critical commodity, you know, and that they need to protect their data and all data that the company owns at all costs. And I think there's there's a lot of truth to that, right? But there's certain data sets that maybe aren't aren't so critical and and and you can you will need to probably share anyways in the future. I mean, I remember when I was at um future prop tech, which was the forerunner to CRE tech back in back in the early um, isn't it I think it was in Olympia in in London, or by Angel, it doesn't matter. The and there was a big panel. Um, this must have been 2016, 2017, there's a big panel, a bunch of real estate, you know, asset managers, uh, CEOs were being asked about the the benefits, the value of sharing data more openly in the real estate ecosystem to you know support transactions, uh, just create general transparency for everyone who's trying to invest in that in that financial product as to the the performance, true performance of of that building. And they all spoke, you know, waxed lyrical about how great it would be if everyone did that. And then and then at the end, the moderator asked, So are you gonna do it? And they all said, No, no way. Right? But I've I've digressed, you asked me about the the value of uh of energy data.

SPEAKER_00 23:58

Yeah, and why is it so important in our industry? Yeah. Particularly our industry in context, but obviously we know it's important wider than our industry, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:08

Yeah, well, I think I've I've I've touched on a couple points, um, a couple points already. Ultimately there's a regulatory pressure note, and I think I think that's what's really moving the needle is is the stick, not the carrot. Yeah, you know, there's um I mean there's a lot of talk now about new sustainability regulations and reporting requirements coming into the UK, um, which I think are are hopefully um and that's you know, slightly self-serving as as one of the co-founders of Meto Z, but also, you know, from a from a wider impact perspective, I think really critical, um, hopefully going to come into place. So which ones are those for people who are not not aware? I mean, the most people are reporting into the the kind of standard optional ones at the moment, right? So you've got things like Gresb and Brienne that already spoke about, which are important and they're already kind of a benchmark, but there's this conversation. I don't know whether there's actually a name for for all of them yet, to be honest. Um, but there's this conversation is about bringing in kind of mandatory carbon disclosure for the real estate sector and the UK in general for large organizations, which is going to match the kind of the the EU CSRD style reporting. Um obviously that's being scaled back, and they've had some teething problems with with how it worked. It was far too onerous. And I mean, having having spoken to some of the consultants and people working on it really was a lot, and and a lot of it was kind of fluffy and didn't need to happen. But that's I think that's ultimately the way that the UK is gonna head as well, is that we'll have that push. And a lot of our customers are actually uh funds that have a combination of European and and UK assets and are therefore kind of front-running that in the UK and have to be part of that that early shift. So no, I think I think that's I think that's gonna be really important, is just the reporting side. And then there's you know, just the just the decarbonization. I mean, you know, workmen and and iboss work loads on BMS controls and and energy efficiency, right? It's just kind of where the the rubber meets the road as far as energy data goes. You know, what are you doing with your systems? Why is why you why is your chiller running at full pelt in the middle of winter, you know, or just which is all the kind of crap that you hear about all the time in the industry, you know, but people just aren't aware and they don't do anything about it because they don't have that that thread of energy data pushing.

SPEAKER_00 26:12

Oh, the visibility. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Um and I think going back to what you're saying, I think for me something I'm quite passionate about is probably two parts in terms of how we score, look at the buildings. It's energy intensity and carbon intensity. And when the stick, the regulatory, catches up, and I think it will do actual in-use energy intensity and carbon intensity scoring on buildings is gonna be be the big ticket, and I think that will drive huge change and hopefully some really big innovation and make it even more important to be capturing that data correctly.

SPEAKER_02 26:52

Yeah. No, no, 100%. And it's I mean, we should we should speak about um assurance and data quality in a moment as well, because it's it's a really it's a really important thing. But uh just just on your point there, neighbours, for anyone who doesn't know what neighbours is or or or hasn't heard about it, is is is an Australian scheme, which is which does exactly what what what what you just described, isn't it? You know, it's all it's all focused about energy performance in use, it's quite rigorous. And and when it was mandated in Australia, it it completely changed the game.

SPEAKER_00 27:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:19

You know, they they have some of the most energy efficient and sustainable building stock in the world now, purely because they've moved away from kind of an EPC style assessment, which is still what we have here. Theoretical. Yeah, exactly. You know, finger in the air, oh, you know, your windows that you installed 20 years ago were working like this. Maybe we never actually tested it, but that's what the kind of you know, our modeling said. Yeah. You know, to actually just looking at, well, this is your energy consumption, this is how big your building is, there's your score. And it and it should be that simple. Because it is that simple, really.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

It is. But one day it'll catch up.

SPEAKER_02 27:50

Yeah. I mean, on the um on the assurance point, this is I think it's a really interesting topic that that we've been dealing with a lot, is that and and this is this is one of the challenges with the kind of the electrolink and M-PAN database point as well, is that a lot of the information that's in there is manually read. And a huge amount of our projects are about reducing manual meter reading. You know, we come into projects where people do five, six, eight days a month of manual meter readings, you know, especially large shopping centers, places where there's a large density of tenants to kind of square foot square meter. And you can imagine that person that's doing those meter readings is going completely insane. Yeah. You know, imagine I can barely get my three readings at home, right? You know, my my my gas water electric. Imagine doing three readings for 200, 300 retail units over the course of a week. You know, threes become eights, you know, you start jumbling numbers around, you know, you forget the key to one of the meter lockers, scribble something down, right? Like who can be bothered? It's such low value work for someone as well. You know, in an age where we're all talking about automation and and and and AI, you know, you've still got someone walking around scribbling down numbers, which is, which is, which is just ridiculous, you know, doing doing manual data.

SPEAKER_00 29:01

And really as seen as the norm.

SPEAKER_02 29:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Which in this day and age it does seem baffling.

SPEAKER_02 29:08

It's it's so backwards. You know, I mean some of the projects that we've spoken about, yeah, we just just just all over the UK. And and and we see it all the time. You know, I was I was speaking to some of the team at Collio's last week, we were talking about about similar challenges at a few of the industrial parks that they're working on. And you know, the term the AMR, automatic meter reading, has been around for a long time, but it's it's a dated term at the same time because it's not really automatic beyond it being on a screen somewhere in the basement.

SPEAKER_00 29:34

And confusing.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

I think the whole terminology, the whole AMR terminology, especially in the industry, because AMR means different things in different in the same industry, which also is really confusing. Um so yeah, I think it's generally quite a confused world in that in that sense, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 29:54

Smart metering is a great example as well. We speak to loads of the word smart is its own, you know, like the thing, isn't it? But the you know, we speak to loads of customers that are talking to us about how they're undergoing their smart meter rollout. Which when they say that, what they mean is that their utility provider is working with their meter operator, their mop, so I don't know, Octopus is working with EDF MOP, you know, or Stark or Grimserv to deploy smart meters on the main incomers for their buildings. And they then believe that once those are installed, they will have full and easy and simple data access at all time. It's not the case.

SPEAKER_01 30:29

No.

SPEAKER_02 30:30

It's not the case. And and I think there's just this this this confusion around the terminology, as you say, right? You know, automatic, smart. There are all these kind of sexy words that people are trying to throw in to make things sound like they're gonna be just simple and and and seamless from that point forward. But it's but it's quite the opposite. And it's such a, you know, metering, quite frankly, such a boring topic. People don't really want to engage with it, right? I mean, it's it's it's almost as an industry, it's almost as as well, it's not as old as real estate, that's hyperbole, but you know, is it since we've been paying for utilities, you know, electricity, water, gas, and I have no idea how long ago that was, maybe the early 1900s. Um I'm sure there's been metering, right? And and and and and people have been doing it this the same way almost since. So it's it's it's ripe for change, it really is, and and it needs to change to support this decarbonisation that we're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 31:18

And I think that that's it, isn't it? Fundamentally, energy data without knowing what your energy data is for a property, how are you going to implement change to drive it to net zero? Yeah. I think that's as simple as it is, you need the data to understand where your baseline is, where you are, and then what you need to do to move the dial. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:40

And it's and it's so important as well. You know, I think I've I've heard a few people say recently that they've that they've given up on efficiency, which I think is such a stupid thing to say. You know, there's there's this mindset, oh, you know, Mark Zuckerberg and Meadow are building, you know, a data center outside Washington, DC that's gonna have as much annual energy consumption as New Zealand. Why would I bother optimizing my systems? You know, why would I bother doing something? Well, I mean, first of all, there's cost, which I think is is is is an obvious argument, right? You know, you're gonna save money by by doing this. But second of all, it's it's it's like deciding at home that, oh well, actually I've got solar panels on the roof now, so I'm just gonna leave everything on all the time, because I don't really care. I just don't know how people can go to bed at night thinking that way, you know, and and and thinking that that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

Yeah. I and I think you know, we saw a real shift change in terms of focus on things like IBOS, for example. Obviously, it was important, smart building, intelligent buildings was was growing and really important, but then kind of our service and kind of what we're we're trying to do, which is essentially make buildings more efficient and more energy efficient and optimized, then got really serious when suddenly energy prices changed. Yeah. Um and it needed something like that to really spur people on, and maybe people starting to get a bit just blind to blind to that now because they're so used to these elevated prices which we're in now and need needs a refresh, maybe.

SPEAKER_02 33:11

Yeah. And and and I think there's this this mindset that renewables are just the answer, you know, and then and then that's what I keep hearing. It's like, well, I've got two choices. I can either try and optimize and reduce, or I can just get you know a a PPA, stick a bunch of solar on the roof, and go, why can't you do both?

unknown 33:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:26

You know, and and does it not make sense for you to do both? Because it's because I think the really critical thing is it's just the the amount of easy wins, right? People, you don't need to PID, you know, they're gonna say a bunch of technical words now, but you don't need to you know fine-tune PID loops on on you know controllers in your building and PID. It's it's it's basically when you do the controls on a on a building, right? You do a BMS, you have the actual curve which is controlling the valve positions and things, and you can make minor gains by basically adapting, adapting those things. But the you know the the the critical thing is just turning things off that are that shouldn't be running.

SPEAKER_00 34:01

Yeah, first step should be get the energy data, optimise how the building's running, get it running as best as you can, and then your renewables come after. You're gonna be spending a lot less money on your renewables because you're you've got a lower base load to be handling in the first place. So you should be following those sort of steps in that sort of order so that you can actually then make the most impact for as little cost as possible as well.

SPEAKER_02 34:24

Yeah, yeah, no, exactly. And it's it I mean, I I remember we worked on a project that shall remain unnamed um for the purpose of uh of this public conversation. But we we worked on a project back when I was uh at Hoorley in uh in central London, it was south South London actually. Um massive new development, mixed to use kind of resie retail, you know, had gym in it, all that kind of stuff. And they had they had specified um, I think it was three CHPs, three three combined heat and power turbines as part of BREAM, which was which was all the craze back then with with Briam is to get these combined heat and power turbines. And and uh they they came to us and they said, well, we've got these immensely high energy bills. They were they were going through millions and millions of pounds a year. And you know, we said they said, well, we we just can't figure it out, we we don't understand where we're burning all this energy. And we were on site for about a day, and I remember looking at all the all the systems, you know, the the the the BMS panels and the logs and stuff. I was just looking at it, and I was just like, well, you you're running, you turned the CHPs off because they didn't know to use them, right? So they're just running the boilers. Pretty standard, pretty, pretty standard move. But they'd forgotten to turn the pumps off that were running water through the CHPs, and they were just running at four pelms. So they had like they had like three sets of parallel pumps that were rated like 330 kilowatt each that were just running at four pelm, pumping water through these three CHPs, and you're just like it's what you're burning like a a megawatt of energy? Constantly trying trying to do this? It's it it's just ridiculous, that kind of stuff. And I do I do think there's an endemic challenge there around the facilities management in the and the building engineering space as well. You know, that the facilities management industry has been erased to the bottom on cost for so many years. And the and the people, unfortunately, that are being asked to operate the buildings are not particularly well paid and therefore not particularly high skilled. You know, they're they're they're great at doing basic maintenance, they can, you know, fix locks, fix doors, do do the kind of more manual side of the work. But when it comes to more in-depth engineering skill sets, you need they typically need a hat, basically. And and and and their focus is less on energy normally and and and more on on comfort and just keeping the thing, the thing running, right? So yeah, it's it's hard.

SPEAKER_00 36:42

So I think that brings us on nicely to kind of big picture position, really. So why is change required in in the industry and and why is it so important?

SPEAKER_02 36:56

I alluded earlier to the um the 40% of global emissions uh conversation, right? And and I think change in the industry is uh it goes beyond climate as well. I think you can talk about you know how we how we use our buildings and do that more effectively, of change in kind of town centers, communities. There's a whole whole world of topics that you could cover in theory, but uh focusing on the climate side, the the the change that we need to make as an industry is is is going to be one of the big uh kind of pieces that that moves the dial towards a more sustainable future. I don't think there's I don't think there's any question about that. You know, so much focus on the transition to to kind of decarbonize mobility, you know, EVs and and hydrogen-powered lorries and trains and all those things. That if all of mobility was fully cleaned and green, that would still not be as much of an impact as you could have just focusing on commercial property. Right. And and and if you think look at the attention that goes into mobility and the interest versus what goes into property, it's it's it's night and it's night and day. It's staggering, isn't it? There's there's there's just there's just I don't know whether it's been marketed poorly or or it's just not as sexy, you know, people don't see it as much, which is which is not true because we see buildings all around us all the all the time, right? But we just kind of take them for granted. But it's it's so critical that that something happens now, and I and I think there's there's there's a lot of different component parts to that change that being put in place. I mean, you've you've been more involved with real estate than than I have for for for even longer. So I think you've probably seen it call it call it on the dark side uh for for even longer than I have. But it's it's it's it's hard, isn't it? It's it's it's hard to drive it forward.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

Yeah, it's it's bringing light to some of the dark arts which people see in buildings and really showing them that it's uh it is possible to change and you don't have to run a building and work in the same way which we have done for however long we can we can change. And yeah, it we've we've made some really big impact and there's you know so much more to go at. Uh so it's really it it's exciting. It's exciting to be part of that change, isn't it? And you're obviously quite passionate about that as well, is you know, feel like we're we're doing something that's legacy, it's it's gonna be making an impact, and we'll hopefully see that in the future. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:20

And and I I think the critical thing, especially for the real estate industry, is that the technology is there. Yeah. You know, they they we don't need the next shiny thing. There's been so much buzzword bingo over the last you know five, eight years, which which I think has actually been really toxic for our space. The the kind of the important objectives which can actually be achieved with technology like decarbonisation, have been kind of lost in this quagmire of buzzwords around all the you know uh tenant engagement or you know, whatever, God knows what some kind of crazy thing that's going on. And don't get me wrong, they all have their merits, they're all they're all good things, but but we need to need to really pull back now and focus on the critical issues facing the industry. And and the critical issues or or the critical issue from my perspective really is is the piece around around decarbonizing it. And and that's also I mean, there's obviously a lot of other issues as well, so don't get me wrong, but the the the piece that technology can influence most out of those critical issues that real estate has is the decarbonisation. And the and the tech really is there, it's just about breaking down all the structures and the and the complexities. You know, we I mean Meteor D's are really interesting because in in that sense, because we sell into such a broad spectrum of organizations. What we do is is applicable to a whole different range of types of businesses. You know, we sell into companies that are owner operators, and so they're large multinational household brands, companies like Ryman, you know, that that own a lot of real estate retail, they own their own distribution centers, they pay the energy bills, and they have a vested interest in not only decarbonizing, but just saving money at the end of the day. You know, that's that's what they want to do. Then we sell into a kind of owner-operator in the real estate sense, where they have an embedded property management facilities management function as part of the asset function. So one of our big customers, a company called Via Outlets, absolutely brilliant. You know, I'm traveling over to Sweden tomorrow to go see the Swedish center. We're doing three centers with them already, big fashion outlet centers. And they have a vested interest in saving money because they also pay a lot of bills, but more critically because they are fully in charge of the decarbonisation of their portfolio because all the function sits in-house. So they really need the data not only for their sustainability team, but they need it for their facilities team. They need it for their, you know, their asset team, and it and it kind of starts to come. And then you go and start starting to come into the broken apart side, right? You know, you you have you have the asset manager who's interested, but ultimately outsources the problem to consultants and property managers. Consultants and property managers are trying to get the data, but they have different asset types that they're dealing with, where it's really complicated. You know, it's it's it's it's a real, yeah, it's a real quagmire of confusion, I think, as to who the ultimate beneficiary and therefore ultimately the person who should be paying for an energy data solution should be. And that's a really that's the hard part to break down. It's not it's not the tech. The tech is there for us to drive that change. And I think there's there's organizations that are that are deploying that in a meaningful way to try and make that change happen that are out there. But it's just trying to break down that that really confusing layer cake, which I think, I mean, this is my opinion, I'd be curious to hear yours, but I think it just comes out of age. It's it's one of those things, it's an industry that's just been around for so long that it's it's grown organically, and just when that happens, I think you just get a huge amount of stakeholders and and call them middlemen in some instances, who don't really you aren't really sure what role they're still fulfilling, but they're there because they've always been there. Yep. You know, and they and they have relationships and therefore they're just they're just not going to be removed either from the addition to anything.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

Well that actually really brings us nicely into my my last question and one which I like to ask all my guests, which is does commercial real estate need evolution or revolution?

SPEAKER_02 43:14

I suppose it comes down to how you define the two. How would you define evolution versus revolution? Is that or is that for me to define? That's for you to define. For me to define. I'm gonna go with evolution. Um I don't when I think of revolution, I think of completely abending all the all the existing structures uh which exist, which which I don't think is is necessary. I think I think there are a lot of you know great real estate companies out there that are that are trying to do good work and that are driving the change. I think the key for me is what I mentioned at the start, is making that change accessible for that longer tail of buildings out there. You know, we can we can't all be applauding, you know, the the superstars, you know, the Heinz and the Schroeder's and the and the Groveners. They're brilliant organizations and I love you know the crown state, I love what they're doing from a climate perspective and that they're pushing on, but they still only represent such a small portion of that stack, you know, of that that that pile of buildings that we need to deal with. And it's about how we take those learnings and the great things that those amazing front-running organizations do and apply them to that long tail. And and for me, that is that's that's not a revolutionary concept. It's it's just about kind of you know, greasing the wheel. It's I think it's a good way to think, I mean, Meteor D is uh an interesting analogy because we're not a deep tech company, you know, we're not trying to invent a miracle cure for cancer or you know, inventing the next light-speed rocket booster. You know, we're we're we're delivering uh a service around energy data, which is hardware focused, it's based ultimately on metering integration and placement. It's just slightly better, slightly faster, and ultimately more cost effective critically than what's out there at the moment. And that's what makes it accessible to the long tail. And I think that's what it is.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

It's just an evolution that needs to happen, not uh, and I think that's kind of how we got in in initial contact really is is putting putting in solutions which are scalable and affordable across whole portfolios, and that's how we're gonna really drive change, isn't it? 100%.

SPEAKER_02 45:09

We need we need to be dealing with those, you know, uh 10 10 room small regional offices in in in places around the country and and and you know, small industrial parks, not just you know, the the latest new build in in central London that's got you know a multi-million pound Schneider control package that quite frankly works pretty well. You know, that's there's that that's good stuff anyways. It's it's about those other buildings that that don't have access to that that kind of wealth, um, both both in literal and figurative sense and from a knowledge perspective to be able to do stuff.

SPEAKER_00 45:39

Well, thank you. Uh thank you very much for joining me today um on the podcast. Uh it's been great having you on and hearing your insights and and and genuinely your passion around driving change and innovation in in this industry. So thank you.

SPEAKER_02 45:53

Yeah, thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

It's great to be here.