We’ve all been there before. Tick the box. Yes home delivery. Hang on. Not sure if I’ll be there, maybe I’ll divert it through the office mailroom. Add special instructions to allow for a range of scenarios just in case. Either way, the problem of the inconvenience, and the nuances of the local post office and each individual courier service is frustrating to say the least. There must be a better way.

Enter the Smart box.

Right now it seems like everyone is getting on board. Australia Post, Coles Click & Collect, A.D.A.M., Pitney Bowes, Amazon, Wal-Mart, Google Bufferbox, Droplocker, Paczkomaty, Citybox,  have all developed solutions but the technologies are pretty similar and the concept goes something like this.

• - Order your item online.
• - Designate a smartbox delivery address where your details are registered.
• - Courier arrives at Smartbox address and checks in.
• - The courier nominates the size of the parcel they have (S, M, L) and a suitable size locker door pops open.
• - Once the door is locked with your consignment safely stored inside, the courier can notify that their delivery has been completed.
• - You then receive an SMS text notification and special PIN unlock code advising that your parcel has arrived with instructions on how to retrieve it.

Of course there are variations on how this works and even laundry services are getting on board with a similar approach such as the highly innovative Laundry Locker service based in Francisco and Australian Coles Click & collect Service.

Property Developers need to start taking note! More and more people are ordering online and increasing the demand for delivery of small mail items, irregular size parcels, wine, laundry, dry and perishable groceries. Mail rooms everywhere are hurting and many companies are grappling with how to deal with this problem.

The knock on effect is creating a spatial demand in commercial offices, residential apartments and shopping centers that involves new design thinking. Space is valuable, so a smarter way to deal with this problem is essential. Developers could use this technology as an opportunity to: provide a value add service for tenants or residents, provide self service mail room options, reduce space allocation within buildings, align to third party service providers etc. There are many options to explore.

The key point to recognise is that in our increasingly online world, change is inevitable. Now is the time to revisit a better, smarter and more convenient way to handle the delivery of packages of all shapes and sizes into your building.

Are Smart boxes the answer? Or are they just a new tool as part of a bigger logistics ecosystem?

So why would property development industry care about such a topic? The simple answer is data. In today’s world, data is king. Mapping is an incredibly rich source of visual information that can be used in all sorts of ways by visitors, customers, consultants, contractors, suppliers, authorities, facility manager managers, asset fund managers and so on.

Maps allow people to overlay abstract information that is otherwise locked away in spreadsheets and databases to visually display data in an instantly recognisable form that can be navigated and interpreted with little or no training. Using maps, information can turn to knowledge and more informed decision-making resulting in better user experiences, as many case studies at the Atmosphere event highlighted.

The Google map event highlighted just how far the technology has evolved in just 7 years from when they first started. Today, we have progressed from a world of ungainly physical maps of various scales and folding techniques (that would confound an origami expert), quickly bypassed dedicated GPS navigation devices (sorry Harvey Norman), to now be able to use the smart phone in your hip pocket to get turn by turn navigation from a real time generated map.

Google’s mapping guru Louis Perrochon, who is the Engineering Director of Google Maps & Earth Enterprise, explained the technology behind Google Maps and Google Earth to the audience. And it’s truly phenomenal.

Google currently has a image database of 20 Petabytes (20 million gigabytes) which is mashed together in real-time with 47 million Km of road data, traffic conditions, business locations and street-view imagery it has gathered for 187 countries. All of this information is accessed by over a billion users a month with the servers maintaining an uptime availability of 99.995% and capable of serving individual, real-time generated map tiles in an average of under 10 milliseconds. Every year over 19 million kilometres a year of mapping data is surveyed, added or updated by various means such as cars, trikes and backpacks. The pace of accumulation of data is staggering…and you wonder why Apple struggled in their first iteration of their mapping product.

A number of case studies were presented at the event including Allianz Roadside assist, Fortescue mining, ICON Health and Fitness and Ergon Energy.

• Allianz are using mapping to help stranded motorists recognize where are using streetview and to accurately dispatch service vehicles. Result: massive improvements in customer service.
• ICON Health and Fitness  has an amazing integration of Google maps and streetview into exercise bikes and treadmills called iFit (https://www.ifit.com). Result: a phenomenal first person experience to exercise virtually on any road in the world with the machines matching the incline of the street up to 40 degrees!
• Fortesque metals recognized mapping data would be their strategic point of difference. They generate over a Petabyte of their own mapping data and mash it up using Google Earth to overlay every type of data you could possibly imagine including: flora and fauna, indigenous sites, evacuation route, blast zones, safety signage etc. Result: massively accurate and detailed data resulting in huge gains in operational efficiency and risk mitigation.
• Ergon Energy has embarked on one of the most innovative mapping exercises in the world where they are mapping every area of their 150,000km of assets the cover 97% of Queensland down to centimeter accuracy in a program known as ROAMES Remote Observation Automated Modelling Economic Simulation Result: A mashup of mapping, LIDAR scanning and massive databases of data they have been able reduce a $100M annual vegetation pruning bill down by 20%.

 

So how could mapping be used in property development? The only limitation is your imagination:

Simulation of building placement for planning
Indoor mapping of buildings, campuses and precincts.
Retail centre strategic planning
Construction site safety planning and management
Portfolio asset management
Facilities asset management
Augmented reality visualization
Mobile applications
etc.

The Google Atmosphere mantra said it all. “Know Sooner. Plan Smarter. Engage Faster.”  So what are your thoughts on how mapping could be used for your property development?

The key influencer, I believe, has been the adoption rate and familiarity with personal technology such as smartphones, iPads, tablets and laptops. Take the amazing picture here that sums up in one image how far the rate of technology adoption has gone in 8 years. (The top photo is from Benedict XVI announcement in 2005 and the bottom photo from the announcement of Pope Francis I in 2013) No fancy chart needed!

Today of course, it’s not unusual to have multiple devices and be more or less permanently connected to the online world. There’s a lot you can do with the smartphone in your pocket such as mobile banking, shopping research, map locations, view videos, book a ticket, change a tune and the list goes on. The only limitation is the current size of the Apple iTunes or Google Play store and your own imagination to find what works for you.

With familiarity then comes expectation. As we then get more and more familiar and comfortable with our own personal tech, our expectations then shift and we begin to ask questions like. “What else could I do?” and “Wouldn’t it be great if…” Now, thanks to Internet based technologies, a lot of the answers to these scenarios can be realised using technology that is far more accessible, affordable and user friendly than it has ever been in days gone by.

For example, as of today, I can:

• Automatically turn on the hallway and bathroom lights at night to 20% level.
• View various webcams of our house to assure me that everything is OK at home.
• Remotely arm and disarm my security alarm.
• Have my house alarm automatically text me if there is an issue.
• Automatically irrigate my garden based upon local rainfall and weather patterns and never worry about remembering to water the garden again.
• Automatically put the pathway lights on after sunset when the front gate is opened.
• Enter the house using a biometric fingerprint scanner and never worry about forgetting my keys again.

All of these functions use internet based technology and can be accessed from my iPhone, iPad or laptop.

In follow up posts, I’ll talk more about these different areas of automation, how they work, what value they bring and how to think about your own technology strategy and the difference it can make to you or your customers daily user experience.

In the meantime, what’s good to know, is that the topic of building automation and control is turning the corner in our perceptions and realistically is becoming more and more accessible to us all.

So what are your thoughts on automation and how could it be used to help your daily life?

So what does this mean for property developers? Primarily, it sways the expectation meter in the direction of anticipated innovation. A lot of people are thinking that if Apple, Google and Samsung are already throwing all this cool technology at me, surely this should eventually translate somehow to my own house, apartment or office in which I work?

For the discerning property developer, this technology trend offers a world of amazing opportunities to differentiate property assets and enhance the user experience of living and working in buildings. Driven by this market expectation, there are a large range of opportunities to that can be exploited from an existing sea of technological possibilities such as: ultra high speed internet access, real time building monitoring, building automation, wireless asset tracking, automated reporting, safety and security, digital media, media facades, mobile applications and so on.

In order to differentiate your property development in the market, you need to understand which of these fundamental foundation technologies are essential for your primary needs, and those which can be selected and tailored for your target market. This plan will become your technology strategy. Once executed, you should then have  a scalable building technology platform that can be used to improve your building’s performance, comfort level, safety and security and increase the long term value of that asset in the market.

So how will you innovate using technology as part of your property development?

The concept sounds easy, but the reality without the right team and technology platform can be an enormous challenge. Discovery of unknown meters, incomplete data, conflicting codes and formats were all a part of the journey.

But the end result can be stunning as Dominic and his team found out. Working with Switch Automation, AMP Capital were able to eventually connect all of the energy meters across their asset portfolio to a cloud based platform known as Switch Smarthub. This platform now provides a range of visualisation tools such as heatmaps, charts and benchmarking to finally get a visual reference to the performance of their assets.

…and as they say. “If you can’t measure it. You can’t manage it.”