CREtech New York 2024 – Interesting exhibitors and more
This is not an exhaustive schedule of all the exhibitors, presentations and panel discussions. To gain a full overview I would recommend checking the CREtech website and LinkedIn group site. The purpose of this article is principally to raise the awareness of W&P readership of what was on show and the rationale for making CREtech a part of your professional learning and development plan. The next CREtech events are London on July 1, 2025 and New York City on October 21-22, 2025.
Innovation Stage at the center of the conference space.
Overview
The NYC venue is a large open space with exhibitors stands to two sides, an ‘Innovation’ stage and networking lounge in the middle and at the far end a curtained off main theatre for presentations and panels discussions.
It took me the whole day to get around to all on offer. Some presentations overlap in terms of timing so in some cases attending one session means not attending another. Because of this, it is worth doing some research beforehand to avoid inadvertently missing a session important to you.
CREtech uses the Brella mobile app and before the event is it is possible to set up face-to-face meetings with exhibitors and sponsors.
Exhibitors range from startups to the well-established players; for the established players it’s more a case of explaining new product feature sets and – predictably – how ML and AI is enabling a more valuable solution to an old Use Case.
Here are my selection of exhibitors and presentations that attracted my attention with a W&P mindset:
EV Power Management
EV power solutions that are both ‘turnkey’ and work seamlessly across retail, public and workplace (not home) were on exhibit. https://swtchenergy.com/ is a North American provider but there are many like it in each geography e.g. BP Pulse (UK) and EVBox (Netherlands).
The solar turnkey operators were represented by www.ivy-energy.com . The ability to determine a beneficial cost benefit analysis is becoming quicker, easier, outcome more certain and capital financing part of the package.
Waste Management
The ability to efficiently arrange for waste collection and track waste from building to final processing is being made more streamlined and transparent with systems like www.getdimension.com and www.getwats.com – Integration of data points is the key here; the ability to extract data from invoices and verify waste volumes and disposal rates make for a compelling SAAS product.
Digital ‘Information’ screens
Captivate (www.captivate.com) illustrated how the typical ‘in building’ information screens were becoming more sophisticated and content dynamic. There is scope here for more integration of architectural media walls, wayfinding, e-notice boards and advertising.
Bio supporting ‘green’ cladding.
Plantaer (www.plantaer.com ) demonstrated a new form of masonry tile capable of supporting plant life, akin to a green wall. To quote: ‘Plantaer specializes in a groundbreaking carbon-negative material that supports plant growth on buildings and roads.’ Worth a look.
AIoT Image-to-Sensor and Security
I attended an enlightening demonstration/presentation on the application of the Sony IMX500 camera system (https://developer.sony.com/imx500) being applied to imaging to sensing technology. I was particularly drawn to how this system addresses a lot of the privacy issues by replacing the person with a wireline image.
The presentation was given by Sony (manufacturer), Scenera (a systems integrator) and Wachter (installers). Scenera’s web site has a lot of information that helps make sense of the opportunities (see here and Youtube here ).
Sony IMX500’s edge AI capabilities make it well suitable for integration into a LoRaWAN (Long-range Wide area Networks) systems. I am learning about LoRaWAN as part of an upcoming W&P article on SMART Buildings.
A related exhibitor, Motorola, was demonstrating their new CCTV technology, which reminded me that this is a convergent area of occupancy management and risk management that we need to keep up-to-date on.
Innovation Stage – audio delivered via wireless headsets worked well.
Portfolio and Market/Location Analysis
There were several exhibitors offering systems that addressed the use cases around understanding property markets relative to either your own portfolio or searching development/investment opportunities. Clearly this is an area of much activity and commercial value. An example is www.placer.ai
Surveying & Mapping
NearMap (www.nearmap.com/) provided a presentation on how their aerial photo product has now reached the level of image resolution that allows for a wide variety of surveying and mapping use cases (e.g. building condition assessments, measurement, risk assessment). They claim that imaging taken from planes makes the imaging consistently clearer than satellites and cheaper than drones. 3D and panoramic image composition widens the use cases.
IoT Platforms
With so many varied IoT devices there is a need to integrate them into a unifying platform, that goes on to deliver analysis, dashboards, etc. Examples at CREtech were www.akenza.io and www.leni.co A sub-group is where a BMS sends information to a cloud based platform that uses ML to optimise. See www.paritygo.com
WiFi in Buildings
Delivering good wifi broadband access to all areas of the property is now key to both extracting the best from IoT investments and delivering the expected customer experience. This was reflected in a few exhibitors operating in this space. www.gigstree.com is an example focused on multi-family properties.
Smart Contracts (Document Management)
The integration of blockchain with document management was exhibited by www.integraledger.com , a global network for document and contract automation that is private, peer-to-peer, and software agnostic. Most estate managers are familiar with this. The key here was its agnostic integration into E-Systems like DocuSign.
Digital Twins
Digital Twins meet active property management – I came across Redleaf Digital Twin ( https://www.redleafdigitaltwin.com/ for an application of this technology in commercial property management. I was expecting to see more Digital Twin exhibitors as this is a big area of PropTec. May be they are all focusing their efforts on events such as the Building Digital Twin Association 5th international conference (next 13-15 May 2025, Kaunas, Estonia) – there are many such events in USA but less building / property specific.
ESG Reporting
This is undoubtedly a growth area and being showcased at this show by www.measurabl.com . I am unsure whether such systems will become part of the feature set of larger IWMS or stay separated out, specialized and just be better integrated.
Protech Integrators
Not everything on offer will meet all Use Cases ‘off the shelf’. There may be a need to have Protech specialist to develop customised solutions. www.taazaa.com was present, providing a solution engineering consultancy service, designing and running custom Protech software.
Other exhibitors
Beyond Workflow – Salesforce made a presentation around how their product has moved beyond CRM and Workflow to a more holistic approach, drawing in data from other specialist systems e.g. a lease administration. They promoted the Salesforce Data Cloud approach. Note: Salesforce is changing their pricing strategy with the introduction of Agentforce read here.
Start-Up Ecosystems – BeEngaged by www.Berkadia.com , a Berkshire Hathaway broker, is seeking to establish an ecosystem for proptec start ups. This makes sense so they are connected into the new ideas.
Contacts management – I came across Linq, ( https://buy.linqapp.com/ ) a digital business card, which made me question whether it was time to change my current paper business card approach. There is a good review here https://samanthabrandon.com/best-digital-business-card-linq-review .
Keynote and Panel sessions
I attended 2 sessions:
Sustainability
Billed as a fireside chat, this was a conversation facilitated by Emily Wright (Head of Content CREtech) with Carrie Denning Jacks (Director of Innovation, Jamestown LP) and her client, Gina Ciganik, CEO of Habitable.
Main stage during the Jamieson/Habitable panel session.
Win data, Win AI
Lastly, a keynote address by L.D. Salmanson, CEO and Co-Founder of Cherre, focused on the importance of data in making AI a success. Well produced slide deck supporting the messaging. This is an important topic to follow not least as there is a school of thought that says that actually the most important thing in AI will be change management around a complete redesign of the business itself.
For other key note and panel sessions please refer to the CREtech web site.
Posted by Marcus Bowen for Work&Place, 20 November 2024
The 2024 NYC CREtech Team: (left to right) Michael Beckerman, Kay Ross-Baker, Emily Wright, Lindsey Imperatore, Kyle Halls (missing Lauren Watson and Bryan Rippeon)
