Improving Wellness, Sustainability & Efficiency in Smart Buildings

Originally posted on the Behrtech blog.

1. Tell us about MERO. What is your focus and vision? What are your products?

Mero provides an analytics platform for commercial properties; helping save millions of dollars on commercial cleaning and supply costs. Deployed in over 60 commercial buildings around the world, the IoT platform allows buildings to minimize their environmental impact, control costs and help the world return safely to public spaces. The product provides sensing on critical supplies like soaps, sanitizers, and paper products, and routes cleaning staff to areas over 30% more efficiently. Originally posted on the Behrtech blog.

Mero is building upon its vision to provide a platform to own the complete operations supply chain of commercial properties, bringing innovation to a massive, traditional industry.

2. How do you see the commercial real-estate landscape changing in the wake of COVID-19?

Commercial real estate is facing the difficult reality that their spaces will no longer be the same. Variable occupancy rates are causing pressure on commercial landlords to find new cost savings in areas they would not have searched in the past. Gone are the days where landlords could wake up each day expecting 97%+ occupancy rates.

This opens the future to more dynamic, on-demand ways of doing business. For commercial properties, one of the largest expenditures is labour. Mero is improving the future of commercial properties through more dynamic cleaning practices. This means only staffing cleaners when occupancy rates dictate it. Mero’s predictive occupancy algorithms are able to forecast future occupancy in buildings with a simple peel-and-stick sensing device.

Mero’s approach is consultative in nature, helping their customers find end-solutions with simple, flexible hardware.

3. What role does smart cleaning technology play in enhancing health and comfort of tenants?

Tenants are the most vital part of the back to work experience. Surveys show that 72% of employees would look forward to returning to the office, but before that becomes a reality, landlords must invest in the comfort of tenants.

Mero has developed a solution directed towards tenant happiness, aptly named Comfort. By visualizing some of the most critical metrics, including current occupancy of a restroom, tenants feel more confident in the highest touch point area in the office. Landlords can inform their tenants of their investment in cleanliness, so they are aware of the choices their office buildings make to support health and well-being.

Landlords will not only save money, but also improve tenant comfort, which can ultimately increase revenue.

4. How do you see smart cleaning technology changing the future of travel?

Similar to commercial real estate, travel is another heavily impacted industry. Mero’s products are equally as important to airports, train providers, and more, by providing the required data to cleaning staff, when they need it.

More efficient, effective cleaning is the future of all of our public spaces, as cleaning staff are the most critical component of any return-to-normal strategy. By maximizing the time our cleaning staff have while they conduct their jobs, we are able to provide both cost savings and long-term revenue increases through improved visitor confidence, helping provide ROI on their technology investment.

5. What’s the relationship between smart cleaning / supply tracking technology and sustainability?

Mero’s products save up to 35% of supply waste through on-demand cleaning, by reducing early roll changes in buildings. This waste has been proven to save hundreds of rolls of paper from the landfill, creating a greener and more sustainable future for all of Mero’s customers.

Mero is dedicated to sustainability efforts and is committing to helping save 1,000,000 trees by 2025.

6. How else will CRE companies benefit from implementing smart cleaning and supply tracking technologies?

Commercial landlords will be able to connect their data with suppliers, to create a more transparent ordering process that will also be on demand. Real-time inventory management in commercial properties will allow for a streamlined process, and supplier and field property owners will be in more control of their consumables.

Furthermore, the data that Mero provides on occupancy will help properties forecast and project their labour spend for months in advance. This will not only create more efficiencies for properties, but a smoother customer experience to the end tenant.

7. What predictions do you have for the smart building market in the next 3-5 years?

All buildings will be smart buildings, on varying levels of implementation. The challenge is to reduce friction upon install, otherwise companies face landlords who plan 5+ years in advance. This is partly why PropTech as a whole is still only ramping up, and other industries such as FinTech continue to outpace it.

Technology also needs to provide ongoing ROI in order for customers to truly embrace it. Mero’s approach to providing low friction, easy-to-install devices reduces this friction so customers are able to get the data faster.

In the future, smart buildings will have a large network of unique applications. Platforms such as BehrTech and Mero provide the innovative technology and wireless connectivity needed to build a centralized platform for all of these applications to function concurrently.

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