I didn’t go to many of the conference sessions at the recent Smart Buildings Show as I was really there for the networking. However, I did check out the one on Your Path to Net Zero: Technology/Software-led roadmap to decarbonisation in building operations by Prabhu Ramachandran at Facilio and Ian Pearce from British Land.

The diagrams are not exactly what I am looking for when it comes to the how the smart building technology landscape might get sliced and diced (see more on this here), but it was interesting to get Facilio’s perspective on ‘enabling the most practical path to net-zero targets with a unified, platform-based approach.’ And having their client with them gives that some validity.

The short version, is that their presentation frames their platform as a tech solution to support the path to decarbonisation – pointing out that a strong tech foundation at Levels 1 and 2 in James Dice‘s Energy Hierarchy of Needs are foundational to see success with Levels 3 and 4:

And also how their platform modularity can help you scale that path:

And how that path to decarbonisation is now based on Cloud-based platforms that go beyond just a Building Management Systems (BMS) on the Cloud:

I thought the drive to net zero framing was a clever way of basically explaining their platform capabilities and would have liked to hear more about how the modularity Prabhu talked about might help with the retrofitting of smart buildings.

Perhaps that is one for another posts along with deeper dive into their platform and maybe along with the findings of their industry-wide survey looking at the State of Software in Smart Buildings 2024 aimed at owners & operators, heads of FM across countries working in the smart building space.