2829: Johnson Controls and the Tech Advancing Sustainable Buildings

[00:00:00] Welcome back gang, there's so many new listeners at the moment. I'm not sure what's happening

[00:00:06] with the algorithms but a big warm welcome to all you new listeners and of course long time

[00:00:10] listeners. I'd remember if ever you need me for anything. TechBlogWriter.co.uk or LinkedIn

[00:00:16] Twitter Instagram to start me off C. Hughes. Love to hear from you all.

[00:00:20] Now in today's rapidly evolving digital era, how can technology serve as a cornerstone

[00:00:27] for sustainable development and climate action? Well as we delve into the intricate world

[00:00:33] of smart building technology, today's guest is the vice president and chief technology

[00:00:39] officer at Johnson Controls. His name's Vijay and he's going to join us to try and illuminate

[00:00:44] the path forward and he's got an impressive track record spanning industry, industry roles

[00:00:49] from spearheading digital strategy at TD and Married Trade to pioneering software engineering

[00:00:55] efforts, he's now leading the charge in redefining the landscape of global smart building technology.

[00:01:01] And Johnson Controls recent white paper entitled The Smart Building of the Future provides

[00:01:08] a blueprint for a world where buildings are not just structures but actually dynamic ecosystems

[00:01:13] that which interact intelligently with their occupants and the environment. Now of course

[00:01:19] against the backdrop of COP28 and the urgent call for climate action. Today's guest is

[00:01:24] going to share insights on how advanced technologies like AI, IoT and cloud computing are not just

[00:01:31] shaping the future but also shaping the future of smart buildings and are pivotal in meeting

[00:01:36] some of those 2030 climate commitments that we keep reading about. Before we get today's

[00:01:41] guest on now I need to give a quick shout out and a thank you to the sponsors of Tech Talks

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[00:02:27] where you can explore the future of secure data management but now it's time to get on with

[00:02:32] the show and invite today's guest on so buckle up and hold on tight as I beam your ears all

[00:02:38] the way state side where VJ is weighing a join us tonight. So a message warm welcome to the show

[00:02:44] can you tell I've only seen a little bit who you are and what you do. Yes hello Nielin thank

[00:02:50] you for having me on the show I'm VJ Sankarin I am the chief technology officer and head of digital

[00:02:57] solutions for Johnson Controls so super excited to be here in this capacity and responsible for all

[00:03:05] customer facing digital solutions at Johnson Controls that includes our open blue smart buildings

[00:03:11] platform as well as a recent acquisition we did FM systems which is all around the integrated

[00:03:17] workplace management space as well as all of our product engineering across the farm which includes

[00:03:24] both our control systems our security systems and other building management systems.

[00:03:30] Well it's a pleasure to have you join me on the podcast today something I try and do every day

[00:03:34] demystify technology and talk about it and a language everyone can understand and also

[00:03:39] the real world problems that we're solving with this technology as well and Johnson's controls

[00:03:43] on my radar because you're leveraging cloud-based services at the edge to break down those traditional

[00:03:49] barriers between devices in smart buildings for example so I'm curious how does that integration

[00:03:56] impact the flow and utilization of real-time data for business leaders. Yeah so I think first

[00:04:03] of all Johnson controls is all about enabling smart buildings and so there are millions of

[00:04:10] buildings out there new buildings different types and forms of buildings hospital school stadiums

[00:04:18] and they all have different types of devices inside those buildings and I think historically we've

[00:04:25] known very little about how those buildings perform whether they're efficient what kind of carbon

[00:04:32] that they're emitting how do we what's going on what are the activities that are going on where

[00:04:37] the faults that are going on how those buildings are being used and so ultimately what we've enabled

[00:04:44] with open blue is a smart buildings data and software platform that collects the data from all

[00:04:52] of the different devices and sensors inside the building and then analyzes that data up in the cloud

[00:05:00] and then based upon AI and other analytics and models makes recommendations around how you can

[00:05:07] actually optimize and improve the performance of those buildings and actually use command and control

[00:05:13] directly back to the building to improve and actually enable those improvements and so it's a

[00:05:20] full building automation lifecycle and really seeking to enable a smart autonomous building as we

[00:05:29] go forward and so that's the the full closed loop and as part of that journey we've employed

[00:05:36] and developed a lot of really interesting technologies one as you mentioned is really have

[00:05:43] leadership at the edge where we are able to securely connect devices be able to efficiently process

[00:05:51] the information that gets that gets transmitted from those industrial devices basically connect a

[00:05:58] wide variety of different types of devices and then using zero trust cybersecurity stream that up

[00:06:05] to a cloud and then in the cloud be able to house that data as both an analytical structure and a

[00:06:12] digital twin structure which is a fundamental representation of virtual representation of how

[00:06:19] that building looks operates and has relationships between different objects in that building

[00:06:25] and then it's the AI which we then apply against that to understand what the opportunities are for

[00:06:32] improving the performance of that building and then we can actually present those recommendations

[00:06:38] and experience and then the user actually has the opportunity to execute some of those commands

[00:06:43] at the local building level through the building automation system that sits inside of those

[00:06:48] facilities all securely and so it's a complete closed loop platform to basically optimize your

[00:06:56] smart building to drive energy improvement and decarbonization which is pretty cool.

[00:07:02] It really is and some other things that really intrigued me about what you're doing here

[00:07:07] is there's two huge topics at the moment that everybody's talking about and has been for the

[00:07:10] last 12 months and that is AI and sustainability. What I love about what you're doing is that

[00:07:15] those two worlds are actually converging so considering the urgent need for climate action

[00:07:21] how is AI enabled smart building technology? How's that helping the future of sustainable infrastructure

[00:07:27] and what would you say are the tangible benefits and also potential challenges that you might have

[00:07:31] encountered in implementing these technologies because I think it's something that will interest

[00:07:36] every business leader listening. Where are they all in the room?

[00:07:39] Yeah so I think this was what's most motivating about OpenBlue and why I came to Johnson

[00:07:46] Controls in the first place is to basically take two of the passions that I have around sustainability

[00:07:52] and AI and be able to apply it to a space in buildings that generates 40% of global emissions

[00:08:01] and so at the end of the day what we're really trying to do is by understanding the energy emissions

[00:08:10] of all of this equipment inside the building and then marrying that up with the sources of energy

[00:08:18] that is being consumed in order to power these devices and understanding what the mix is whether

[00:08:24] that's renewable or fossil fuels and what the mixes are to be able to give our customers

[00:08:32] visibility into what their baseline carbon emissions are. And the biggest challenges to start just

[00:08:40] in terms of base lining is that there are a lot of different types of devices inside of the building

[00:08:47] and really oftentimes perfection of connecting all of these devices, all of these different

[00:08:54] thousands of points inside of the facility and being able to understand what the scope one and

[00:09:00] scope two sort of footprint is is oftentimes an onerous task. And also being able to understand

[00:09:09] the utility consumption some buildings don't have smart metering or any metering associated with them

[00:09:16] and certain parts of the world you can't get utility bills or utility bills are in a format that is

[00:09:23] not comprehensible by a system. And so being able to write different kinds of translators

[00:09:29] and connectors and using AI to get a baseline of both energy consumption and how that converts

[00:09:36] to a baseline carbon footprint, that's a big challenge as a starting point. Then once you can

[00:09:44] get that baseline then it becomes really okay understanding what are the actual things

[00:09:53] that you can do in order to drive improvements against your carbon baseline and how does that

[00:10:01] actually correlate with the targets that you're setting. So many companies are saying 2040 I want

[00:10:08] to be net zero some are saying 2050 some are more aggressive ones are saying 23rd right. But really

[00:10:15] those are just generic targets unless you can break it down and say okay well how am I actually

[00:10:22] going to get there like if I see it's great I'm gonna get there in 2030 maybe I can go out

[00:10:28] and buy a whole bunch of carbon credits to get me there by 2030 but is that well am I really

[00:10:34] getting to net zero right because at the end of the day you're still emitting carbon and

[00:10:38] all you're doing is you're buying offset credits in order to show that you're you're netting those

[00:10:44] out. So then what's what are the micro actions inside the building that you let's take that

[00:10:48] particular sum system that you actually have to invoke in order to get to net zero right so

[00:10:55] what is the age of all of the equipment that you have inside of the buildings which equipment

[00:11:00] are driving a large amount of the emissions. So I know in Johnson controls chillers comprise about

[00:11:08] 40% of the energy output inside of the building and so are you using a 15 year old chiller or

[00:11:15] using a five year old chiller or you're using an air cold chiller using a water cold chiller

[00:11:20] so that's where we start the journey is to really do an inventory assessment of all of the equipment

[00:11:25] types inside of the buildings and then we have what is called ECM's which are energy conservation

[00:11:33] measures that basically you can think of them as actions that you can take that can give you

[00:11:40] different scenarios to model around your carbon emission output. So let's say you have a 15 year

[00:11:45] old chiller and you look at what the carbon emissions are of that 15 year old chiller and you're

[00:11:51] saying oh my gosh I'm not going to get to 2030 with that 15 year old chiller right so then how do

[00:11:57] you actually make the decision as to whether or not buying a brand new York chiller will help you

[00:12:05] attain those goals and so that's where these ECM's come in where you can actually model out the

[00:12:09] different scenarios and then you know what the power of the full Johnson controls is is that

[00:12:15] I can then give different customers different types of models to bring on that new equipment so I

[00:12:20] can either do cooling as a service where we'll guarantee you certain you know improvements

[00:12:26] around the cooling performance and the energy efficiency we can do net zero as a service where

[00:12:32] we'll actually come in and replace all the equipment that is driving against your net zero targets

[00:12:39] and then so you can we have different programs for different types of customers where we may finance

[00:12:44] it or we may deliver performance outcomes against those KPIs and then the AI where it comes in is

[00:12:52] more even at the micro level okay so I if I live in an area like Michigan and in the summertime

[00:13:02] sometimes we get cold spells do I really need a chiller to drive my air conditioning at the same

[00:13:09] levels all summer long right so based upon the external weather I can actually autonomously use

[00:13:16] the AI to change the chiller set points in the in the chiller you know the the chiller function or

[00:13:25] based upon if I'm in a building and the fact that people aren't coming in on Fridays during the

[00:13:31] summer I can turn it up a few degrees so that I'm not too worried about the personal comfort that

[00:13:36] people have or if there are certain spaces like common meeting rooms and things like that where

[00:13:42] it's not being occupied I can vary the temperature in those spaces so there's lots of different variables

[00:13:49] inside the building where you can use the AI to basically autonomously vary set points very equipment

[00:13:57] settings that individually on a daily basis may not add up to a huge amounts of savings but collectively

[00:14:05] put together can give you a 10 to 15% improvement in both energy efficiency and carbon emissions

[00:14:12] that become sizable when you're when you're when you have a portfolio of buildings whether it's at

[00:14:18] a university campus or a school district or a reat that has 150 to 200 properties that they own

[00:14:24] across the globe and and so you know what what I think the real powerful nature of what we do is our

[00:14:32] digital tools help us both baseline and benchmark and then make recommendations but then also

[00:14:39] manage it over time autonomously with the AI so you can continue to run those buildings efficiently

[00:14:45] and drive that decarbonisation. And another area of fun incredibly intriguing is the concept

[00:14:51] of digital twins in the context of smart building so can you just explain for anyone that's not

[00:14:57] familiar with this how Johnson's control is utilizing this technology to enhance building performance

[00:15:03] and user experience and what does that continuous feedback look like between the physical and virtual

[00:15:09] realms. Well I'll tell you I just got back from Singapore a couple of weeks ago and I would say

[00:15:17] in Singapore are the most progressive adopters of digital twin technologies and it is super cool what

[00:15:25] they've been able to to showcase and so I met with a couple of large real estate holding companies that

[00:15:34] a large number of properties across Asia and they want to be able to show and see what's happening

[00:15:41] to their buildings in real time. And so obviously if you have if you're in Singapore and you got

[00:15:49] building in in Kuala Lumpur and Malaysia it's not the easiest thing to be able to take potential

[00:15:56] investors and take more of a Kuala Lumpur and show them the building. And so with the digital twin

[00:16:02] we actually enlist their mission files we convert all of the assets the building into

[00:16:12] where are the assets located what are the details of the assets what's the data at the assets

[00:16:17] so that you can actually within open blue go in and view virtually like think virtual reality

[00:16:25] what the building looks like be able to 3D zoom around it go to specific floors show the floor

[00:16:33] show the entryway and it's pretty amazing what you can do virtually in terms of being able to

[00:16:40] show and share the buildings. Now what we then do is a lot of people are going to this notion of

[00:16:45] like an integrated command center where you let's say that you have 100 buildings that you're

[00:16:50] managing and you don't want to have operators in every single one of those buildings looking at

[00:16:56] that portfolio. So then you have this integrated command center where you have the digital twin

[00:17:02] of all of your portfolio and if something goes wrong you have a fault or a ticket that comes up

[00:17:08] you could actually zoom in into the visual representation of that building go to that particular asset

[00:17:15] see where it's located be able to activate cameras that are around it and showcase the actual

[00:17:21] ability to operate your facilities remotely. And one of the most fascinating examples of this for

[00:17:29] for me that we implemented in 2022 was the or 2023 was the FIFA World Cup and so

[00:17:38] it was the first time in history where the World Cup wanted to have matches going on at the same

[00:17:46] time in multiple different facilities and so they had eight stadiums where we implemented the

[00:17:53] unified command center for those eight stadiums. We had a digital twin for each of those eight stadiums

[00:17:59] so you could look at turn styles, common areas, offending areas where there were alerts,

[00:18:06] where the different eating and cooling units were and so from a central location in Qatar they

[00:18:12] were able to see where the issues happened across all of the facilities at the same time without having

[00:18:18] to have staffing to manage those facilities locally. And so it's pretty amazing what you can do

[00:18:25] in terms of overall operating management and showcasing of your facilities using a digital twin.

[00:18:32] Just incredible. I love that example. From your perspective, just for anyone listening,

[00:18:36] especially business leaders, what would you say the key strategies for effectively

[00:18:40] implementing these kind of advanced technologies in smart buildings and how do you

[00:18:44] with Johnson's controls get that very far balance between innovation and practicality in your

[00:18:50] approach? Yeah, I mean at Johnson's draws, we're focused on solving problems inside buildings

[00:18:58] and really delivering outcomes for our customers. And so when I look at the key outcomes that we're

[00:19:05] trying to deliver, we're trying to deliver energy efficiency, decarbonization, asset health and

[00:19:12] and uptime of your buildings and then additional operating efficiencies for your facilities

[00:19:18] management team. So you start from there and then you start to look at like, okay what are the actual

[00:19:24] scenarios that my customers can use to deliver those outcomes, right? And then you look at okay,

[00:19:32] which technologies are available in order for us to be able to do that. So over the last three

[00:19:40] years, we've made three acquisitions in the digital space and they were all intended to solve

[00:19:47] specific pain points that our customers had. So edge we talked about edge and edge data

[00:19:54] streaming and edge data connectivity was a key area of focus. And so how do we connect the

[00:20:00] devices on the edge? How do we collect the data efficiently, right? So we bought a system out

[00:20:05] of California called foghorn systems and foghorn is a leader in edge AI. And so we integrated that

[00:20:11] into our stack. We then needed a way of communicating securely to the crop, the cloud. And so from

[00:20:19] the edge so that there wouldn't be the risk of cyber attacks like existed at colonial pipeline

[00:20:25] things like that. And so we bought a company called temper networks out of Seattle to help

[00:20:31] secure the edge with some which creates a homomorphic encryption tunnel between edge and cloud

[00:20:38] using some specialized forms of encryption. And then most recently, we felt like we needed

[00:20:45] a more simple way to understand the assets and the utilization of building spaces. And so

[00:20:53] so we acquired FM systems out of Raleigh North Carolina who was a leader in the intelligent

[00:20:58] workplace management space around things like asset management and space utilization and really

[00:21:05] managing how the space gets utilized, which is a nice compliment to everything we're trying to

[00:21:11] do in open blue. So we're always continually looking at what are the outcomes that we can deliver

[00:21:17] for our customers and what the pain points are and whether we can solve those gaps either organically

[00:21:23] or inorganically through acquisitions. And so we believe that we've built a pretty powerful

[00:21:29] platform that is really a leader in being able to help companies transition from traditional buildings

[00:21:37] to much more intelligent buildings. And as we record this podcast, we're about a month after

[00:21:43] Davos where everyone was talking about the 2030 call I'm at commitments is again huge topic. Of

[00:21:49] course, where if you've been included in this and how Johnson's controls is leading the chart in

[00:21:54] reducing that environmental environmental impact of buildings which account for significant

[00:21:59] portion of global green house gas emissions. Of course, again, huge topic world leaders are talking

[00:22:05] about it businesses are talking about it. We're seeing more and more about ESG schools and how important

[00:22:09] they're being but where do you see Johnson's controls? What role do you play in this?

[00:22:14] Well, I mean we're definitely at the center of it. I think you might have seen our CEO

[00:22:20] wrote an article for the World Economic Forum after his participation in Davos about AI and its role

[00:22:29] in the smart buildings and really now with the onset of generative AI as well. So I think that

[00:22:36] especially as it relates to sustainability role because as I mentioned, you know, buildings comprise

[00:22:43] 40% of carbon emissions, you know we truly believe that leveraging our technologies and things like AI

[00:22:52] can help make a major dent in terms of the opportunity to help companies drive decarbonization efforts.

[00:23:02] And so I think those are all really, really important that we begin to focus and address on

[00:23:11] and solving some of those pain points as we go forward.

[00:23:15] If we put the microscope under you for a moment, I was looking at you before you came on the

[00:23:20] podcast doing a little research and quickly stood up to me, you've had quite a diverse career too,

[00:23:24] including significant roles at TD, a married trade and a Ford motor company to name but if you

[00:23:30] curious from your own perspective here how those experienced it influenced your approach to technology

[00:23:36] transformation at Johnson's controls because I suspect like they old Steve Jobsquip you can't

[00:23:40] join up the dots looking forward. He's only when you look back isn't it that you can join up those

[00:23:45] Yeah, absolutely. I think you know in terms of my own personal experience, I've been

[00:23:50] you know so fortunate to have different industries that I've spent my career and whether it was

[00:23:59] in healthcare or whether it was in early on in my career or whether it was an automotive

[00:24:04] and then financial services and how industrial and smart buildings and I've always believed that

[00:24:10] the role and the goal of technologies to help solve business problems at the end of the day.

[00:24:15] And so I think in every stop on the journey, I've always looked at it from a customer

[00:24:23] in perspective how do we solve problems on behalf of our customers using technologies?

[00:24:31] And so while AI is game changing, while things like virtual reality and digital twins are

[00:24:37] game changing from a technology perspective, I've always believed that how you take those technologies

[00:24:44] and apply to them to solving business problems is the single most important thing at the end of the

[00:24:49] day. And so at Ameritrade it was really about democratizing and empowering self-directed investors.

[00:24:58] And so it was everything from how do we leverage technology to make invest investments

[00:25:04] and trading easier for that. And that may be something as simple as how quickly can I open an

[00:25:10] account to how quickly can I fund my account to what's the education that's required to better

[00:25:16] understand the markets, to creating a simplified user experience to more advanced traders who are

[00:25:22] looking for high degrees of performance and capabilities on our advanced trading platforms.

[00:25:27] When I was at Ford it was how do we create vehicles at scale really enabling the organization to

[00:25:37] be highly efficient, manufacturers cars with high quality, enable our dealerships to sell those

[00:25:45] cars and service those cars effectively to our customers. And again, how does the technology

[00:25:52] and advanced technologies play a role in driving operating efficiencies as well as customer experience.

[00:25:59] And so the pattern has always been no matter what outside and never inside out which is

[00:26:07] what business are we in, what problems are we trying to solve, and how does the technology

[00:26:13] help solve those problems at the end of the day. And so that's been kind of the ongoing learning

[00:26:19] and journey that I've been on. I think it really helped me starting my career as a consultant

[00:26:25] because the first thing you do when you're a consultant is you go into a new industry and you

[00:26:30] get feedback around what's working well and what's not working well. And that's always how I've driven

[00:26:36] my own orientation around things which is what's working well, what's not working well for on behalf

[00:26:42] of our customers, what problems did they have, and then how do we leverage the technology to solve

[00:26:48] those problems. And so for me, this is all about energy efficiency, sustainability, making it easy

[00:26:58] for our customers to connect their buildings, providing value so that they can really show the ROI

[00:27:05] around investing in a product like OpenBlue. So then I look at okay, then what technologies do I

[00:27:12] need and what do I have in order to be able to solve those problems which is I think the best part

[00:27:18] that's always been the thing that's been most fun for me. 100% with you on that and as we look

[00:27:24] ahead into the future, I appreciate it's probably not too much you can share but is anything you can

[00:27:29] share about the next big steps for Johnson's control especially in the realm of small building

[00:27:33] technology and how you might foresee these advancements evolving over the next five to ten years. And

[00:27:39] I really, that's a crazy question to ask Boone with the speculative technological change on the

[00:27:44] last slide. Yeah, I would say what's really interesting is in the three-year horizon,

[00:27:53] what are the things that again are going to help customers solve problems, right? And so

[00:28:00] a great example of this is leveraging generative AI around giving customers very specific

[00:28:08] recommendations around either how they should service their equipment or how, you know,

[00:28:14] what changes that they should make in terms of different settings or equipment in their buildings

[00:28:20] or even how are they comparing or complying with certain laws and regulations locally. And so

[00:28:27] let me go to the last example which is now there's literally an array of laws and legislation

[00:28:34] that are being passed around local standards for buildings and the indoor air quality of buildings

[00:28:41] and how much energy that you can consume on a quick per square footage basis and when you're going to

[00:28:46] be complying, right? And typically a lot of those things are wrapped within pages and pages of

[00:28:54] PDF documents at the end of the day. And so now with the simple frameworks that generative AI

[00:29:01] provides with retrieval augmented generation, you can basically ask a question, retrieve a variety

[00:29:08] of different answers and then basically summarize that in a way that allows customers to have

[00:29:14] clear indications of how to service and address issues in your building more quickly which is

[00:29:21] super powerful and didn't exist two or three years ago. So that's one huge area of exploration for

[00:29:27] the second area of exploration is really around the utilization of renewables directly on a

[00:29:35] building campus. And so there's an emerging topic of grid interactive optimization which is

[00:29:42] how do you basically optimize your energy footprint both with onsite generation, onsite battery

[00:29:49] storage, load sharing, timing of different utility rates? What is your power purchase agreements

[00:29:56] with different utility providers around the mix of renewables and non-renewables, distributed

[00:30:02] energy resourcing where you might have a grid of solar arrays that are providing power purchase

[00:30:08] agreements? And so how does that ecosystem of energy come together inside of your building

[00:30:13] around what you should actually use when in order to drive decarbonization opportunities?

[00:30:20] And so that's a super cool optimization AI type of situation and I think we're just at the tip

[00:30:29] of the spear in terms of the adoption of a lot of those things around how the types of energy

[00:30:35] and what people have in terms of their own energy footprint contribute to driving net zero or

[00:30:41] the next 10 to 15 years right? And then beyond that there's tremendous amount of product, energy

[00:30:51] efficiency type opportunities that I see in the horizon just based upon the transition from carbon-based

[00:31:00] energy production, think natural gas oil and things like that, too much more electrically driven

[00:31:07] systems right? So keep pumping a great example of something that is rising in demand in Europe but

[00:31:13] that's just the beginning. There's going to be much more modular type devices, electric type

[00:31:19] devices and that innovation has to happen because if you think about the growth in data centers for

[00:31:27] example from all of this AI demand, I mean it's massive power consumption at the end of the day

[00:31:32] and so how do we reconcile the increased demands on power that we're going to have because we

[00:31:39] want to use all these cool capabilities like generative AI yet at the same time mitigate carbon

[00:31:46] outputs that come from the same consumption of those fossil fuels that are required to cover those

[00:31:53] data centers. And so ultimately what's an interesting paradigm is that the most green progressive companies

[00:32:01] are the ones that are building all of these data centers and so at the end of the day how do you

[00:32:07] reconcile that? So the only way to do that is through technology and so I think you're going to see

[00:32:13] an array of innovation that emerges in that intersection between the needs of energy consumption

[00:32:20] and how do you do it efficiently and cleanly so that you're not driving up your carbon footprint on

[00:32:26] a global basis. Yeah so much food for thought there and finally as someone that has led major

[00:32:33] technological transformations what advice would you offer to upcoming leaders that might be listening

[00:32:39] to our conversations, they aiming to integrate advanced technologies into their business models

[00:32:45] particularly in the context of sustainability and climate action and making a difference. Any advice

[00:32:49] you'd offer to anyone? Yeah I mean so first of all I would say you have to really think about

[00:32:57] what problem I'm trying to solve at the end of the day and then what technology do I actually need

[00:33:05] in order to solve that problem. And I'll give you a perfect example we deal with a lot of onboarding

[00:33:12] of buildings so we have different types of buildings that we have to like understand what's

[00:33:17] all the equipment, what are all the points inside the building and how does that map so that we

[00:33:21] understand if it's a fan coil or an air duct or whatever it may be inside the building right.

[00:33:28] Now initially we thought that GBT4 would be the best route for us to help with some of that

[00:33:35] mapping to onboard those buildings but as we were going through the process we found a less

[00:33:41] expensive, higher version of natural language that was a precursor to generative AI that did the job

[00:33:50] just as effectively that was at orders of magnitude of lower cost and was able to effectively solve

[00:33:58] the problem at a high classification rate. And so what the advice I would say is that I know that AI

[00:34:05] and generative are the buzzwords but in my experience in technology all that glitters is in gold

[00:34:11] at the end of the day. It always comes back to what problem are you trying to solve? How can you

[00:34:17] solve that problem most effectively and efficiently on behalf of your customer. And so look at the full

[00:34:25] spectrum of technologies that you have available to you and then based upon that do proof of concepts

[00:34:33] to see what works, what doesn't work, what's the cost impact of it. And then take the leap into

[00:34:39] actually implementing that right. So I have so many examples where teams have chosen the wrong

[00:34:48] technology because they were either marketed to or they bought into the hype of something and then

[00:34:55] it has unintended consequences either in how much they were paying for something or how it solves

[00:35:00] problem or privacy or security type things. And so I think it's really important that leaders

[00:35:06] go slow to go fast to understand what problem they're trying to solve, what technology is best to

[00:35:13] solve that problem. It doesn't necessarily have to be sexy at the end of the day and try it out,

[00:35:18] test it out and then based upon that proceed forward. And other thing is that what you do today

[00:35:24] may not be the right thing in 12 to 18 months and so be ready for a change and design your systems

[00:35:31] with the appropriate architecture that can adapt to that change. And so there's so many profound

[00:35:38] lessons learned that I have around technology. And so I think always focus on how to solve the problem.

[00:35:47] Well, I think that's a profound moment to end our conversation on today but before I let you go,

[00:35:52] I always ask my guests to leave everyone listening with one final gift. And that is a song that

[00:35:57] might mean something to you that we can add to our Spotify playlist or a book that you'd like to

[00:36:02] recommend, that we'll add to Amazon wishlist. What I'm going to ask you, what would you like to

[00:36:06] leave everyone listening with and why? It's a great question. And gosh, I love music and I love

[00:36:11] reading and I'm not sure that's easy to recommend one but since I just most recently saw them in

[00:36:17] concert and it was a profound amazing technological marvel. I'll say beautiful day by you too is

[00:36:25] something that I think would be a great ad. It also reminds me of the beauty of the planet that

[00:36:31] we live on, the beauty of innovation and so many different profound memories associated with that song

[00:36:37] both good and bad. So it's one that I'll leave to your Spotify playlist. They may already be

[00:36:44] on there, I'll leave it. What a great choice. I've got to ask God, I know you probably wish for

[00:36:49] time but what was your spare experience like in Vegas as it raised your expectation for future

[00:36:55] concerts there? It was amazing and it was amazing because for me the sphere is an archetype of

[00:37:05] a concert venue that is neither Arena nor Movie Theater nor Concert Hall. It's basically

[00:37:16] from my vantage point, a mashup of all of those different things so it's basically has the

[00:37:23] characteristics of an iMac screen. It has the fidelity of Carnegie Hall and it has the energy

[00:37:31] of an indoor arena. You put all that together and you put a great one of the greatest bands in

[00:37:38] history in YouTube and there and I think anybody who plays there is going to have a hard time

[00:37:45] matching up to what YouTube has created but I can't think of as do other bands so we would be able

[00:37:50] to achieve it. Coldplay probably being one of them and we'll see who else comes along to try to

[00:37:57] innovate in that particular venue. Wow, incredibly cool and for anybody listening just wanted to find

[00:38:04] out more information about Johnson's controls a lot of things we talked about today or contact you

[00:38:09] or your team. Well do you like to point everyone listening? Yeah I think the best page is our Johnson

[00:38:14] controls website and then I would go to OpenBlue within that which is our smart building software

[00:38:21] platform and it will tell you everything about what our team does in terms of really bringing

[00:38:26] the smart building to life. Yeah and that's exactly what you do and I've learned so much today

[00:38:31] from why the future of next generation sustainable infrastructure is AI enabled all to autonomous

[00:38:37] smart building technology also how the implementation of things like digital twins will revolutionize

[00:38:42] building performance and unit experience. Also that continuous loop between the physical

[00:38:48] and virtual including everything through AI IoT and cloud computing to create recommendations

[00:38:55] maximized for the efficiency and ROI. So much gold there for me but more than anything just thank

[00:39:00] you for sharing your story today. Thanks so much for having me Neil it was it was wonderful to

[00:39:05] have a conversation with you about the future and what technology continues to do and changing

[00:39:11] our lives every day. Now as our conversation with VJ comes to a close I think we're left with a

[00:39:16] profound understanding of the transformative power of technology. In creating sustainable

[00:39:22] smart buildings a little more than another AR headset right because today's discussion has

[00:39:29] not only highlighted the innovative OpenBlue platform and its role in optimizing building performance

[00:39:35] but also underscored the critical importance of AI enabled sustainability measures in addressing

[00:39:41] global greenhouse gas emissions. And with things like digital twins and advanced analytics they're

[00:39:47] paving the way for efficient autonomous building management and I think it's clear that the future

[00:39:52] of infrastructure eats already here and each smarter and more sustainable than ever.

[00:39:57] And as we consider some of these insights shared by VJ today I think we must ask ourselves how can

[00:40:03] we as leaders, as innovators, as human beings leverage these technologies to not only advance our

[00:40:09] enterprises but also contribute to a healthier planet. Will please join me in reflecting on this

[00:40:16] question and share your thoughts with me on how we can all harness the potential of smart building

[00:40:22] technologies for a sustainable future and you could do that by emailing me techblogrideroutlook.com

[00:40:28] my website techblogrider.co.uk and you can get me on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram just

[00:40:33] out there you'll see here so let's keep this conversation going. I'm going to rest my vocal chords now

[00:40:38] because we have another great guest lined up to join us tomorrow so I'm going to go get a rest.

[00:40:42] I'll be back tomorrow morning so thank you for listening as always and until next time

[00:40:47] don't be a stranger