Proptech panel: Enabling commercial buildings for the digital age
Commercial buildings can be revitalised and made more valuable to tenants without moving a single brick – if the digital plumbing behind them is right.
In this Proptech Association Australia panel, moderator Carolyn Trickett of JLL Spark Global Ventures brought together Sean Lucas of Essensys, Chris Mason of MobileDock and Mosstyn Howell of UbiPark to examine how digital infrastructure, automated loading dock scheduling and smart parking are helping asset owners respond to hybrid work and changing tenant demands.
The panellists noted that a precinct such as Barangaroo handles more than 10,000 deliveries a month underground, and that hybrid working had pushed some CBD car park utilisation down to around 30 per cent – a figure smart parking platforms can lift dramatically. The conversation also covered leasing velocity, revenue leakage, environmental benefits and how autonomous vehicles may reshape parking and logistics.
On the panel:
Carolyn Trickett – Growth Principal, JLL Spark Global Ventures, and Proptech Association Australia board member (moderator)
Sean Lucas – Asia Pacific Head of Sales, Essensys
Chris Mason – Chief Operating Officer, MobileDock
Mosstyn Howell – Founder and CEO, UbiPark
The conversation covered:
(00:06) Carolyn Trickett opens the Proptech Association of Australia panel by acknowledging traditional custodians and introducing guest speakers.
(05:10) Sean Lucas outlines how Essensys helps navigate the fragmented, hybrid world of work with extreme personalisation across commercial portfolios.
(06:39) Chris Mason highlights the logistics nightmare of surging online shopping deliveries arriving at commercial buildings with restricted street parking.
(08:12) Mosstyn Howell explains how asset owners are tackling return-to-office friction and integrating parking into single-source security systems.
(09:34) Sean details the Essensys Cloud and Platform products designed to deliver secure, enterprise-grade connectivity for flexible spaces.
(11:46) Discussing the broader use cases for Essensys beyond co-working, moving into plug-and-play spec suites and shorter lease tenures.
(17:47) Chris shares his background from Telstra and PwC before joining MobileDock, solving the warehouse truck-scheduling problem.
(19:31) Comparing MobileDock to airport air traffic control, automating loading dock management and scheduling vehicles to eliminate street chaos.
(24:39) Mosstyn recounts his 26 years in parking operations, moving from stamping early bird tickets in Melbourne rain to digital platforms.
(27:00) Exploring parking-as-a-service and how UbiPark integrates with smart property apps like Equiem and Host alongside access control systems.
(29:47) Mosstyn notes how hybrid working pushed CBD parking utilisation down to 30%, which UbiPark can lift to 98% while repurposing space.
(33:36) Chris and Mosstyn discuss potential collaborations between MobileDock and UbiPark to streamline retail precinct loading docks and parking apps.
(37:31) Chris addresses the environmental benefits of dock scheduling, cutting down truck idling and reducing delivery vehicle kilometres.
(39:39) Examining the future impact of autonomous vehicles and AI on parking and logistics, turning car parks into service hubs.
(46:25) Sean breaks down the return on investment for asset owners using Essensys to drive leasing velocity and meet enterprise digital demands.
(49:00) Mosstyn explains how automated parking rules eliminate revenue leakage from unpaid permits and boost asset value.
(51:00) Chris discusses how MobileDock metadata helps developers optimise loading dock sizing during the planning phase of new towers.
In their words:
“Think how an airport works with planes, right? And the analogy around an airport is a very apt one. Planes arrive at an airport in accordance with a schedule which is set by the airport itself. Now, that's managed through air traffic control, and what that does is it ensures that all the planes don't arrive at the same time.” – Chris Mason
“In Australia especially, and around the world, parking's tied to status. Where you are sitting in your role, and your role being tied to what COVID has done and hybrid working has done, it's actually allowed us to get more people in the office, in the company back into a car park, actually in the building.” – Mosstyn Howell
“In a world where hybrid is sort of the norm and it's quite hard to now quantify the utilisation across a particular asset, let alone a portfolio of locations, it's all those moving parts and the complexity that sort of flex and hybrid and these working patterns is delivering.” – Sean Lucas
About the panel:
Chris Mason is the chief operating officer at MobileDock, bringing a background in technology at Telstra and PwC to solve commercial and industrial vehicle scheduling challenges. Sean Lucas is the Asia Pacific head of sales at Essensys, supporting clients across the commercial real estate spectrum with digital infrastructure for flexible, multi-tenant spaces. Mosstyn Howell is the founder and CEO at UbiPark, drawing on 26 years in parking operations and hardware sales to transform asset utilisation through digital parking platforms.
Transcript:
This is an automated transcript of the panel, lightly edited for readability. Please excuse any errors.
Carolyn Trickett: Welcome, everybody, to today's proptech panel. I'm Carolyn Trickett. I'm a growth principal at JLL Spark Global Ventures, and I'm also on the board member at the Proptech Association of Australia. And this is the first time that I'm hosting the proptech panel. It's very exciting. I'm here in the JLL offices today, um, which is in, on the land of the Gadigal people of the, the Eora Nation. In the spirit of reconciliation, Proptech Association of Australia acknowledges the traditional custodians of cust- country throughout Australia and their connections to the land, sea, and community. We pay our respects to their elders, past and present and emerging, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples joining us today. I'd like to thank the fabulous support of Stone & Chalk, who make these panels possible. For those of you who don't know, Stone & Chalk was founded as a not-for-profit in Sydney in 2015 to help FinTech startups commercialise and grow. From 40 startups in 2015, it now has hundreds of startups in Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide, covering all areas of emerging technology, including proptech. So let me start by introducing my guests on the panel today. We've got Sean Lucas, who's the Asia Pacific head of sales at Essensys. Hi, Sean.
Sean Lucas: Hi. Thanks for having me. Great to be part of the panel and discussion today.
Carolyn Trickett: Thank you. We've got Chris Mason, who's the chief operating officer at S Train Group, also known as MobileDock. Chris-
Chris Mason: Good morning, Carolyn. And good morning, everyone. Thanks for coming on.
Carolyn Trickett: It is afternoon here in Sydney.
Chris Mason: Oh.
Carolyn Trickett: Isn't it afternoon in Melbourne as well?
Chris Mason: It's technically not the afternoon until you've had your lunch, so if anyone has had their lunch-
Carolyn Trickett: Okay. All right. We'll stick with that one. Um-
Chris Mason: But-
Carolyn Trickett: Mosstyn Howell then, also based in Melbourne, founder and CEO at UbiPark. Good morning.
Mosstyn Howell: Good afternoon, Carolyn. Thanks for having me.
Carolyn Trickett: Thanks, guys. All right, so let's get stuck into today's topic, which is all about enabling commercial buildings in the digital age. I hear a lot of buzz lines in the industry, things along the lines of, "Real estate is slow to adopt technology," or, "The property industry is averse to change." But this is a sweeping generalization. I've been in this industry for over 15 years, and during that time I've watched firsthand the commercial real estate landscape undergo a remarkable transformation in response to the rapid advancement of digital technologies. Commercial buildings have evolved beyond mere physical spaces, and have become intelligent, interconnected ecosystems. From the integration of smart building systems to the rise of flexible workspaces and the increasing focus on wellness and sustainability, the digital age has fueled a paradigm shift in how commercial buildings are designed, operated, and experienced. In parallel, human behavior has changed dramatically over the last two decades with the introduction of the internet, mobile connectivity, smartphones, and cloud computing. And every year we as humans adapt to more services and facilities being available in the palm of our hand, and as a result, every year our expectations continue to increase. Along with that, e-commerce is creating changes in behavior. We're ordering everything online, having it delivered wherever you are. And what does that mean from a logistics point of view? There's change all around us. Then hybrid working brings another layer int- onto our expectations. I wanna choose which days I work in the office, and when I do go, I want it to be a frictionless experience, completely connected and seamless. Oh, and some of us would also prefer a selection of different offices to go to. And when I choose one of those, I want everything to work smoothly as well. So all this has created a new set of challenges for commercial buildings. We're gonna explore some of those challenges today and introduce you to an intriguing mix of technology solutions to address them. Each solution contributes differently to making the commercial built environment a more efficient and productive place to operate. So with all these layers of change, let's start by highlighting some of the challenges that commercial building owners and occupiers still face, and often face more of, in the world of 2024. Sean, can you give us your view on some of the challenges y- that you see in your area?
Sean Lucas: Yeah, sure thing. Thanks, Carolyn. So you've, you've summarized, uh, very well there and, and touched on a lot of those sort of key underlying sort of issues and changes that obviously the broader industry is experiencing. So, um, to, to that point, I think what we at Essensys do is, is sort of, uh, look to support our clients in an increasingly sort of fragmented world of work and, and sort of across the commerc- commercial real estate spectrum. Um, obviously, as, as a lot of these trends were, as you said, already, uh, very much in place, but were just simply accelerated, um, post-COVID. So, um, in, it's our view that, that we're, we're going to continue to see that develop into a world of sort of extreme personalization as far as the office is concerned. So I think you mentioned earlier sort of not just- The binary option to work from the, from the office or from home, but, but, but perhaps a network of locations that, that might suit those different needs. Um, I myself will do two or three days in our office, a day or two at home, but oftentimes a day at a client site and then that can be anywhere from Sydney CBD or, or somewhere closer to home, right? So, um, that's exactly sort of the world in which we're, we're supporting our clients sort of manage and navigate through, um, and, and try to provide the technology that, that better enables that.
Carolyn Trickett: Thank you. And for a very different angle on that, Chris, can you explain challenges that you're seeing in your line of work?
Chris Mason: Yeah. The, the challenge... And thanks, Caroline. The challenge we see is the, is the fact that there are more deliveries coming into more locations. So one of the things that was absolutely true during COVID was everyone got into the world of online shopping. Now, online shopping has translated into online things coming into commercial buildings, and with the numbers of deliveries coming into commercial buildings and the restrictions on street parking for commercial vehicles, particularly within our big cities, the challenges of actually getting stuff into a building becomes harder and harder. So one of the things that Moviloc does is to effectively schedule the arrival of each of those vehicles so as to effectively remove congestion. Um, interestingly, our business has kind of got two halves, one in the commercial real estate section and one in what would be known otherwise as the industrial real estate section. So we're helping on both sides of the equation in so much of how do the shippers of the product actually manage the inflow and outflow of their own warehouses, and how do the receivers, you know, sometimes not quite willing receivers of products in commercial buildings, kind of get all of that stuff in and out. So a very vibrant space.
Carolyn Trickett: Thank you. And Mosstyn, I think the challenges that you're gonna describe are an interesting mix and angle on the two challenges that Sean and Chris have just highlighted. What can you tell us?
Mosstyn Howell: Yes. Thanks, Caroline. I think there's probably two main challenges we're hearing from asset owners. The, the first is around helping, uh, tenants get staff back into the office, especially in a world that doesn't, um, doesn't seem... uh, see us in the office, uh, five days a week anymore. That's not normal. Uh, so getting that flexibility and the flexibility to, um, have a car parking space that maybe the CEO isn't using or a CFO isn't using on that day. And the other area I think is, uh, probably more topical in, in the, in the, in the f- in the current environment around security and having everything integrated into the current access control systems, having that as a single source of truth, and having that as the way that gets people in and out of the, uh, the asset.
Carolyn Trickett: Right. So that paints a pretty challenging landscape for a lot of different commercial buildings, which is why we've put this panel together today to talk about some solutions that have come up in the, in the proptech world that help asset owners to address these. So let's get stuck into a bit more detail about that. Sean, can you explain a little bit more about the Asensus solution and how it helps to create internet connectivity for people in commercial buildings?
Sean Lucas: Yeah, sure thing. So at Asensus, we, we primarily help automate the management of, of tenants and digital services and spaces across our clients' portfolios and, and deliver a network of, of connected locations. So we do this via two main products. We have our Asensus Cloud, uh, which is our global private cloud solution. Um, provides enterprise-grade, as you just mentioned there, Caroline, enterprise-grade, resilient, secure connectivity, um, to help support sort of smarter buildings and spaces, which we all know is, that's all trending in one direction. And then our Asensus Platform, which is the software interface that automates the s- complex processes and all that's involved at the back end of managing those occupiers and provisioning the, um, the IT services required.
Carolyn Trickett: So do you think that improved digital infrastructure in commercial buildings is essential for the management and operation of flex and multi-tenant spaces?
Sean Lucas: Yeah, definitely, and I guess, like, it, it always has been. But I think that the key change, as, as Mosstyn and, and yourself have just, um, alluded to there, uh, is, is the, the nature of the space and, and how it's being utilized has just changed so significantly over the last four years. So, um, i- in a world where hybrid is, is sort of the norm and, and it's quite hard to sort of now, uh, quantify the utilization across a particular asset, let alone a portfolio of locations, it, it's all those moving parts and the complexity that sort of flex and hybrid and these, these working patterns is delivering. And so that, that core infrastructure and the ability to sort of manage the spaces, as Mosstyn's mentioned there too, the security that sort of needs to underpin it all, who's in the building, when and where, and for how long. Um, so that, that... all of those challenges sort of culminate in, in what we would suggest requires more tech-enabled solutions and, and that digital infrastructure to be really, uh, meeting those needs.
Carolyn Trickett: Is Asensus really a solution just for co-working spaces or has it got a bigger use case?
Sean Lucas: Yeah, great question. So we, we sort of grew up in that serviced office era. I guess we, we've been around for 17 years now, and the sort of co-working evolved or the boring version of co-working, I guess you could say. That's maybe being a little bit unkind, but serviced offices and co-working. But increasingly it's, it's sort of- Flexible space in the most generic and, and sort of, um, widely used, um, version of that term, right? So amenity spaces, meeting rooms, any on-demand spaces within a building. Um, all the way through to plug and play spec suites, for instance. So, uh, lots of our clients now recognize the fact that in, in a sort of leasing market or an environment where the, the lease tenure's perhaps getting a little bit shorter on average and tenants are expecting agility, not just within sort of built environment, but also the technology. They're providing fully plug and play and, and connected spaces to, to help meet that demand.
Carolyn Trickett: I was in one of JLL's coworking spaces last week, actually, a newly opened one, and, uh, I was given my little guest Wi-Fi and, uh-
Sean Lucas: Nice
Carolyn Trickett: ... noticed that Essensys was in place.
Sean Lucas: Yeah.
Carolyn Trickett: So can you explain more about that practical side of managing a coworking space and, and why that solution is helpful?
Sean Lucas: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Um, I'm glad you... I hope you had a, a seamless experience, Caroline, last week, but, um-
Carolyn Trickett: Perfectly seamless
Sean Lucas: There you go. Great. I'll let them know. Um, so yeah, the, the really the, the demand from enterprise users, so I think like going back not, not that long ago, right? You could sort of get by with a fairly basic network infrastructure and, and technology that was underpinning all of that. But increasingly, and there was obviously a couple of fairly high-profile instances of, of cybersecurity issues, um, last year, increasingly landlords and, and operators are recognizing the fact that they need to meet the sort of most stringent enterprise demand, and that has downstream benefits for everyone, right? Whether you're a boutique law firm or a sole trader, uh, you might as well have the, the, the best, most resilient sort of solution in place to meet everyone's needs. Um, i- in that example you gave there last week, it's then how efficiently and, um, seamless can you make that experience from the end user's perspective. So in, in your case, obviously you were a guest in that building for, for a number of hours in an afternoon. Um, and, and that then also goes to say that when you're onboarding a tenant with multiple users, say even 50, 100, 200 users, um, who will be moving into a given space, you wanna make that as frictionless as possible, whereby the, the person turns up to their new office and opens their laptop and clicks a button, and, and they're securely connected and ready to go. Um, so that's sort of where we, where we focus our attention and, and support our clients with, with that.
Carolyn Trickett: Right. And have you got another example that you could share with us, Sean, about the type of client setup that really needs Essensys to make things work smoothly?
Sean Lucas: Yeah, sure. So I think, um, the... One, one of the best examples, I guess, from, from late last year was a client of ours who has a, a flex offering and a sort of, um, more akin to, I guess, coworking, but it's a landlord that's offering it. Uh, and they had a tenant grow, I think from circa 10 staff to about 40 in a, in a very short period of time, which is always a great problem to have. And the flex floors were actually fully occupied. So without a solution, without the sort of latent infrastructure or the core infrastructure already in place, in a normal sort of scenario, they probably would've lost that tenant in- into the outside market. But a- as a result of what they could do, they had a spec suite available, fully fitted, ready to go, and they just simply connected that space. And so that, I think the client now, our team was probably fairly stressed through this process, I must admit, but they, um, had signed the agreement, I think sort of later in the, later on a Thursday or Friday, and they moved in the following Monday. So that, that sort of, sort of onboarding cycle or that, that, I guess, speed to market that you can help, um, deliver is, is sort of really key as to what the, the market is now, where the expectations, I guess, are shifting in the market.
Carolyn Trickett: When you say that they were able to move in that following Monday-
Sean Lucas: Mm
Carolyn Trickett: ... so that's the ability to have every person walk in the door and get connected to the internet and all the devices in the space as soon as they walk in?
Sean Lucas: Connected on their own private network. And so they're already tenants within the building, right? Within that flex space. Um-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Sean Lucas: ... but they, they, the spec suite, so one week it didn't have connectivity, the next week it did. They moved down-
Carolyn Trickett: Mm
Sean Lucas: ... level 20, it was, um, down to a lower floor where the suite was. And to your point, the printers, the, the, the Google Chromecasts, all of the security devices all connected, and, and the end users are sort of getting, getting to work that next day as well.
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah. I remember the days when the printer was a completely different network, and you could never know if you were gonna get it to work.
Sean Lucas: One person in the office that could use it properly, and they, they got badgered by everyone else. I was the one doing the badgering, mind you.
Carolyn Trickett: Oh, it's great how that stuff's connected these days. Cool. Thanks for that, Sean. Chris, let's move on to you, 'cause you've presented a pretty interesting angle on digitizing buildings. The system that, that Mobile Doc has, has built is, it's a bit of an air traffic control system really for transportation in and out of commercial buildings. Can you tell us a bit about your background and how you got involved in this space?
Chris Mason: Yeah. Thanks, Caroline. So I've been with Westring Group now for close to 10 years, believe it or not. Um, after a career in primarily big companies, so I was, uh, in the technology side of Telstra and also PwC prior to that. We came across, you know, Mobile Doc for us has kind of evolved out of a problem that we were trying to solve, which was how do we help some of our customers solve the issue of how do they get staff into warehouses? And the challenge there is that a whole bunch of trucks kind of typically arrive all at the same time. Now, if you're running that warehouse and you've got operators in that warehouse and staff, and you've got stuff to put away, it's not very helpful to have either 1 or 100 trucks arrive on any given morning. So we worked with them, you know, years and years ago on the basis of, well, those things should be scheduled, right? There should be some process of u- the site itself having visibility of what's gonna arrive when. And from that we realized that the process of being able to, um, schedule that is actually relatively quite straightforward. But more importantly, the problem doesn't exist just in warehouses, it operates right through cities and a whole range of different environments, and doesn't just operate in Melbourne and Sydney, it's actually a problem globally. So from that, we got all excited and kind of drove ourselves nuts drawing up different kind of schematics in relation to how it is the Mobil- the MobileDock solution might, might, um, might, uh, work.
Carolyn Trickett: When I'm working with proptech startups, I love the backstory of how the solution came to life, and often it is someone working in a, in a related area, feeling a pain point, who then comes up with that idea. Love it. And so can you, can you outline a little bit more detail about MobileDock and how it's used and, and who actually uses it?
Chris Mason: Yeah, for sure. So the, the easiest way to think of MobileDock, and we describe it as an automated loading dock management system, and most people at that stage, their eyes glaze over and they go, "What does all that mean?" We go, think how an airport works with planes, right? And the analogy around an airport is a very apt one. Planes arrive at an airport in accordance with a schedule which is set by the airport itself. Now, that's managed through air traffic control, and what that does is it ensures that all the planes don't arrive at the same time. Now, when you think about why that is, you think, oh, there's pretty good reasons for that. Now, of course, as a traveling... as part of the traveling public, you know the experience of taking off and then being sent to do laps around Melbourne or Sydney or Brisbane or any other city because there isn't a slot available for you to park on the ground. Now, if all the planes arrive and there was nowhere to park, you'd imagine the chaos that goes on. In the world of ground logistics though, so ground logistics being the deliveries of something into a warehouse or an opera center or an arts center or a shopping center or a hospital or a convention center, we work on the basis of who gets there first wins, and that's pretty much the mentality of the way the drivers work. So what we do with MobileDock is we work on the basis of, well, let's take the principles of air traffic control, insomuch that the site itself can firstly determine who can land at their site, so there's an approval process to work out who do you want to actually come. And then the not just when do you want them to come, but where do you want them to park. So of course you want the big planes to park where the big planes go, and you want the little ones to park where the little ones go. And you want to have, you know, not all planes are as important as one another, so our rules engine allows people to determine, you know, what's, you know, what's more important to them in terms of those particular deliveries.
Carolyn Trickett: So if you've got all this work happening in the background to schedule all these deliveries-
Chris Mason: Mm-hmm
Carolyn Trickett: ... what then happens? What happens if a driver shows up late? Do they get kicked to the back of the queue?
Chris Mason: Yeah. So look, one of the first things we realized was that of course drivers are drivers and traffic is traffic, and the world of kind of-... perfect scheduling is kind of one thing, but then that meets operational reality on the other side. So we worked very hard at solving what I described early on as the doctor's problem. And the doctor's problem is the one of a doctor has five-minute appointments, and if those five-minute appointments start running late, if you've got an appointment at 4:00 in the afternoon, you'll wait for an hour because they've been exactly one minute late all the way during the course of the day. So the way we do things with MobileDock is we say we allow the system to calculate the time of the booking. We don't ever let the drivers tell you how long they need to be on your site. We calculate that for them based upon the rules. We then allow a period of buffer time, because even though an appointment may be, say, for 11:00, we know categorically that that driver won't be there at 11:00. They'll be there 10 minutes either side of that, which is totally fine because the buffer process will allow enough kind of natural leeway in relation to, you know, how it is they are gonna be going to arrive. Now of course, if they arrive at 9:00 in the morning or 3:00 in the afternoon, it's then to the site to determine whether or not firstly they like that driver, whether or not... And importantly, they'll have visibility of what's gonna happen at 10 past 9 or at 10 past 3. So when they do arrive at one of those times, they can go, "Ah, actually we're gonna be full, totally full, so you bugger off and come back later." Or, "Actually, because we like you, you can come in and park, but..."
Carolyn Trickett: Those like factors in there.
Chris Mason: Yeah. It works for us. Mm.
Carolyn Trickett: One day it'll all be controlled by AI, so good luck to drivers then.
Chris Mason: Yes.
Carolyn Trickett: All right. And, um, could you just give us an, a, an example, practical example of a really interesting use case, one of your clients?
Chris Mason: Yeah. So look, a couple, and kind of changes between the world of commercial real estate and industrial real estate. But from a commercial side, Barangaroo. Most people know the Barangaroo location in Sydney. Uh, they have underground loading docks. They're about 75 spaces underground. They take over 10,000 deliveries underground in any given month. Now, if you'd imagine one of the defining elements of the Barangaroo precinct is the amenity on the street level is such that you get a large amount of kind of open space. You don't get a sense that there's 10,000 vehicles arriving every month in and out of that site. So one of the things we've done with Barangaroo is not just help them schedule all those deliveries coming into the building, but make sure that they operate in a way that kind of maximizes the sense of amenity for the location. But we've also taken it to a point of now where it's virtually fully automated with the use of QR code readers, license plate recognition systems, and boom gates, and integration through their building management systems and into contractor induction systems. So really quite a sophisticated process all operating on the basis of how do they make the site more efficient?
Carolyn Trickett: Make a note of those few other types of systems. We can have another panel on those later-
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah
Carolyn Trickett: ... this year. Cool. Thank you.
Mosstyn Howell: That's great. All right.
Carolyn Trickett: I think everyone can probably imagine the, the scale-
Mosstyn Howell: Mm
Carolyn Trickett: ... and the size of a precinct like Barangaroo, where you've got so many buildings and so much interconnected space underneath.
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah.
Carolyn Trickett: So Mosstyn, giving, giving your angle on all of this, s- we're still talking about cars and deliveries. Can you give us a bit of a rundown on, on your three decades in, in the s- parking space?
Mosstyn Howell: Uh, well, Carolyn, I think the, uh... I always say to people that, um, uh, the good people get, move on from parking, and, uh, I'm still here. So I think, uh, um, that's one thing I could say about myself. Uh, but, um, yeah, I've had a great three, uh, decades, or it's 26-odd years now in, in the parking industry in a variety of roles. So originally as an operator. So I've, I've, I've ran parking in, in properties that asset owners, and, and seen that firsthand, experienced it. My first role, uh, in parking was, uh, probably not really overly technical. It was stamping early bird tickets on top of 90 Victoria Parade in 2 degrees weather and pouring rain in Melbourne. Um, so obviously things have moved on, uh, from there. I was lucky enough to get a- Lucky enough to get an opportunity to work in New Zealand as well, and I've seen, um, that. And also, um, you know, moved back from the operating into a technology hardware sales role, selling, um, large, uh, parking solutions to the likes of Westfield and, and airports, um, and large commercial property owners like Dexus and Lendlease and the like. So it's been a variety. Um, and that sort of forward into what we, um, in creating UbiPark and what we're doing today in the digital space.
Carolyn Trickett: I think, I mentioned this a little bit with Chris as well, that in, in the commercial prop tech space, you really do find complex problems. And it's often people that have worked in that space for many years who've seen those pain points that are the ones that end up coming up with the solutions to solve those really complex problems. So tell us a little bit more about the concept of a digital parking platform. How does that contribute to the overall tenant experience within a building?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah. I think it's, uh, parking as a service is probably the best way to put it. It's, um, it's putting parking as a service into what, what is actually, um, operating the building. And we're doing a lot of work with, uh, smart property apps like Equiem and, and Host, where we're integrating the parking in as a service. So the same app that you're using to buy the coffee in the morning or book a meeting room or, or, um, uh, get some catering for your board, board meeting, um, you're also doing your parking, um, transaction from as well. That's probably the main, main thing. And I think the other thing we touched on in the challenges is everyone wants this integrated into the security system now. Uh, so having it seamlessly working with, uh, the credentials that people already have. So whether it's pass card or, or an app, um, or, or another credential to get in and out of the, the, the property. Then using that same, same credential or being able to add things like license plate, which is more specific to the parking experience really seamlessly, but also know that, that, that they're here and, um, uh, what a, and, and the, the security system knows who's in the building at any particular time.
Carolyn Trickett: The concept of, of mixing up the parking, it really does change the, the value of that space, doesn't it? I know in the... For many years the, the parking space was just reserved for the, the head honchos of an organization. You know, if you've, you've been there long enough, you're earning enough money, you got to have one of those very precious parking spaces attached to the lease. So how does that then make the spaces more available and valuable for tenants?
Mosstyn Howell: I think you've touched on a really, uh, big point there and what we're seeing, yeah, yeah, so in Australia especially, or, and, and around the world, that parking's tied to status. So where you are sitting in your role, and your role being tied to what COVID has done and, and hybrid working has done, it's actually allowed us to get more people in, in the office, in the, in the company back into a car park, actually in the building. And, and that's actually helping with the emotion and, and incentivizing people to actually come back into the office. Uh, so I think that's, that's a really, a, a big piece of what, uh, we're seeing now is if we can get, um, you know, not the CEO or the CFO or the C-suite that's ordinarily had that. But, you know, the next level or the level below them, access to that car park, that's helping.
Carolyn Trickett: So can you, can you talk us through some of the practicalities of, of what a user can achieve when they've, when they've got UbiPark in their building? What are the options to them in terms of allowing other people to use that space?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah. So what we were seeing, uh, straight after COVID, and, and even, uh, now we're seeing, um, occupancy rates, utilization rates of 30 to 35% across our CBD, uh, corporate, um, commercial properties. And with a solution like UbiPark, we're able to actually get that up to 98, 99% and, and be able to share those spaces for... So you're getting better utilization of the space. A lot of our customers are using it as, uh, a tenant experience and, and, and putting back to the tenant, and we've got others that are actually using it to create more revenue through the property.
Carolyn Trickett: It just really turns it on its head, doesn't it? Makes, turns parking into a shared economy for the right, the right buildings.
Mosstyn Howell: Correct. It's very- Very similar to Sean. Sorry, Caroline, to cut you off there, but it's very similar to what Sean's doing. Um-
Carolyn Trickett: Mm
Mosstyn Howell: ... we're doing the same, taking the same concepts and running that through the parking operation with our experience. And you have the ability to lock it down and just share it with, uh, so if you've got a set of bays as a, a company in the property, you could just lock it down to sharing it with your staff. If you've got another, if you've got oversupply still from there, well, we can share it with just other, um, tenants in the building. And then if you've still got oversupply, then maybe there's an opportunity to get public parking in and create some revenue out of that space. So it's very flexible. But what we're finding is the revenue is not as big a, a motivator as it is for the tenant experience.
Carolyn Trickett: Mm-hmm. And so you mentioned, you touched a little bit on security. So in the simplest terms, right, the UbiPark platform needs to talk to the boom gates, right? Let people in and out. So is that a challenge? Like, how do you get through that process of working out how to build those integrations?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah. So we've done over 130 integrations now with all sorts of different systems and, and that's probably one of the, the tricky parts of, of our business is getting integration with, you know, the likes of Gallagher, um, Interrange with Infinity and Integrity, um, Genotech, uh, all the different parking equipments that you've got out of Europe, um, you know, SKIDATA, Schotten & Benjamin, um, Designer and the likes. They've all got their own, their own challenges. But what we've been lucky enough is to, we've really got a templated process now to take on a new integration that rolls this out really quickly for us. And there's, uh, good and bad bits around, uh, different, different technologies depending on what, what the requirements are and how old that actually is. But, you know, what we're seeing now is, is definitely a push from the asset owner, which is then putting pressure on the access control, uh, companies to actually make this easier. Um, and, uh, yeah, I've got a, a property we're working on at the moment with JLL, Caroline, in Melbourne that, that, uh, not only are we integrating into the Integrity, which is the, the building access system, but we're also integrating into a smart property app created for one of the new tenants. Um, and they're all working together and so we're sort of being a bit of a middleware in, in between those systems and activating the boom gates from there.
Carolyn Trickett: I think even th- even though these three solutions that we're talking about today have got quite different use cases, it's always integration that makes it more valuable in the overall ecosystem. One of the things I really like about my role is I get to talk to lots of different prop techs, and I often introduce them to each other, and that actually happened because of this panel. When we were doing our prep session the other day, we came across a scenario where Chris and Mosstyn are thinking that their solutions might be able to work together. Without mentioning too many details, Chris, can you shed a little light on that one for us?
Chris Mason: Well, I mi- I might, you know, I certainly can, but I'll look for Mosstyn to, to, to look into that as well. And I think the, the, you know, the thing that both Mosstyn and I are looking at from a, a point of view from parking because, yes, we're kind of at the, the commercial kind of end of the, the, the delivery as opposed to kind of the more tenant end of the, of the delivery process. But it's all about the efficiency of the site itself. There is a constraint in so much there's only so many spaces. At times, if they're not being well utilized, it's really sort of an, uh, an, an, an issue for the site itself. Um, so, uh, I'll let, I'll-
Carolyn Trickett: This is a retail scenario, isn't it?
Chris Mason: Yeah, it is. So, you know-
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... like you said. Mosstyn, do you wanna take a look at it?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah, I'd, I'd be welcome. I think, Caroline, to start off with, as soon as you introduced me to Sean and Chris, I, I was looking for an angle. Um, and I think there's an angle with both, uh, Chris and Sean for the UbiPark technology. So, um, yeah, you're definitely, you're definitely looking, um, on where your solution may be able to help. And look, we're getting lots of inquiries around loading docks, and, and the problem that Chris explained, um, in our, uh, meeting the other day was stuff I'm hearing from asset owners that we're working with. Um, one wants us to build a loading dock solution. I think that'd be silly where I can probably just add Chris's solution directly in.
Chris Mason: Yeah.
Mosstyn Howell: So I think, um, there's definitely, uh, lots of opportunity for, um, our solutions to work together.
Chris Mason: Yeah. Great. And I, I think that sort of comes to also the point of the fact that, you know, the issue of integrations between all these individual solutions is prevalent and I think the, the thought that we have from some customers to say, "Hey, does your solution do everything?" And we go, "No, what our solution does this really, really well and we can talk to..." And quite deliberately by design, we said, "Well, we're gonna build a best-in-class loading dock management system that can then talk. It can talk to boom gates, it can talk to LPR systems, it can talk to other forms of bookings or other forms of building management systems." And I think that is from a, a technology development point of view, the thing that we are big on promoting with the customers that we're talking to is the look for the best-in-class solution and look for the level of integration capability. And with modern APIs and the like, those, um, those integrations aren't as scary as they might seem.
Mosstyn Howell: I think that's a really important point, Caroline, that Chris has just made. I think, you know, a lot of people will say to us, "Can we just tack in, um, a, a, a loading dock booking solution on top of the technology you've got?" And, you know, we're really focused on solving one problem-
Chris Mason: Mm-hmm
Mosstyn Howell: ... where Chris is actually solving a completely different problem and it needs a different set of, uh, skills. Um, yes, we could adapt, um, but it's definitely not gonna have the same outcome as what would be if we actually collaborated.
Chris Mason: Yeah. And with the ability-
Carolyn Trickett: I love that kind of story
Chris Mason: ... yeah, the ability to sort of now we've integrated MobileDock directly into some of our customers' concierge apps within their buildings themselves. So the tenants within the building would be able to access- Presumably kind of UberPark, UberPark for the purposes of, uh, their customer parking. But in order to track their commercial deliveries in terms of, uh, has my box arrived downstairs, yet they can see visibility of that directly through the same app. So, you know, the world is, is really our oyster in, in relation to, you know, how we think about, you know, solving some of those problems.
Carolyn Trickett: All right. So I've seen a few juicy questions coming through on the chat. And, um, I know we've got our, our, our backup team having a little look at those coming through. Um, I've actually just... I'll, I'll flag the first one, actually. Um, I think this one's for you, Chris. What are the environmental benefits of better timing for dock management? Is there a carbon benefit attached?
Chris Mason: Yeah, there definitely is, and that's one of the things, you know, we talk about in so much that, you know, firstly, you know, one of the things we saw very early on with MobileDock was the carriers themselves who were making the bookings became very big at sort of picking up the fact that they were sending multiple trucks to the same location during a day. So one of the things they approached us around was, "Well, hey, we're sending two or three or four trucks to make three or four different types of deliveries during the day. How can we use MobileDock to kind of aggregate those solutions so it's such that we're only sending a single vehicle?" Now, given that we charge on delivery, we kind of went, "Whoa, we don't really like that." But of course-... you know, it was, it was a really good thing, right? Because you get a truck that's coming in that might be making deliveries, particularly in a sort of a retail or into a Brangeroo. You know, if a vehicle from Toll or Australia Post comes in, making multiple deliveries, and that's a very good thing. It's actually is reducing the numbers of vehicles on the road. By having the appointments scheduled so the drivers know that at that proverbial 11:00 they've got a guaranteed car park, they're not circling around the building, they're not idling out the front of the building. So of course there are direct reductions in relation to the amount of kilometers, the amount of time which is being driven around as well.
Carolyn Trickett: All very good points. And it's not really a revenue stream, is it, to charge per delivery?
Chris Mason: No, it's not. Really what we're, we're looking at is the kind of how can we obviously make the site more efficient through the use of the technology and kind of bring-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... value of, and you'd be surprised when you go into buildings at times, the scale of some of these loading docks. There's a lot-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... of underutilized space. Um-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... so that provides, you know, the ability for us to utilize that space or otherwise give that underutilized space back to the landlord to say, "Hey, do something else with that. Re-let that space because you don't need it for the purposes of parking."
Carolyn Trickett: Another question from the audience. Mosstyn, I'll ask you to, to address this one first. How will AI and self-driving vehicles impact the world of parking?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah, I might start with self-driving vehicles. UberPark, um, always had an eye when as, as we were formed around what was gonna happen with autonomous vehicles. Uh, so we believe the, the car park of today will become the service station of the future, and that cars that are driving around will need somewhere to be stored, um, charged, cleaned, serviced, tires changed, um, that type of thing. And I'm sure our government's not gonna let, uh, self-driving cars just roam aimlessly around the streets. So we do think there's gonna be, um, an important, uh, role for our technology to play in, in telling the self-driving car where, um, and how to get to, uh, those sort of locations to, to get what they need. Um, with AI, it's probably a bigger, a bigger question. It's, um, something we're, we're really looking at from a strategy point of view on where we can run AI through our, our platform, and there's a whole heap of, uh, options that we're looking at. How do we support people better through AI? How do we, uh, make it easier for the end user to use or the, or the staff or the tenant to actually use the, the solution through AI? Um, we've just released, um, a, a partnership with a AI dashboard company that's analyzing, um, all the data coming through all the different parking and, and, and other systems from, from the building to actually analyze out and, and show parking operators and asset owners how to actually better utilize the asset and, and actually make better decisions around, uh, rates and things like that. Um, so, so that's been a really exciting, uh, path for us. And I can, I can just see AI definitely taking off through, um, the next sort of era and future of, of parking tech.
Carolyn Trickett: Intriguing concept, isn't it? That the, the parking system might talk to the car and that the car might go off and service itself in different locations, just as long as it gets back in time.
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah.
Carolyn Trickett: And, and Chris, what about, what about your side of things? Is, is there gonna be AI involved between MobileDock and the, the planning systems of your, your big carriers that, that are, you're interacting with?
Chris Mason: Yeah. There's certainly, you know, I would like to think there, there certainly will be. One of the things we can track through some of the metadata through MobileDock is that we can see individual carriers planning routes for their drivers. So they're starting in a warehouse-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... and going to one location, which is controlled by MobileDock, and then half an hour later going to the next one and then to the next one and then to the next one and then to the next one and then to the next one and then leaving, right? So they're able to kind of plan those routes. And you think of, well, if that was an autonomous vehicle, and, you know, a number of our MobileDock customers use MobileDock for the purposes of scheduling the arrival of the vehicles to pick up product to take them out of their sites. So think of companies like Coca-Cola or a, um, a snack brands who are kind of building up product themselves. Once they've got it ready to go, it needs to be sh- shoveled out. They don't wanna have the trucks arriving half an hour early or three hours later than when the product is ready and available on the dock. So they're getting the efficiency, they know where it's going. If those sites are controlled via MobileDock, we can have guaranteed slots for that truck to, to arrive. So it is a little futuristic in its thinking, but it's not impossibly far away to imagine a world whereby a driverless truck in the middle of the night could be leaving a warehouse and going to a known location and parking at a designated time, and then going to another location, and perhaps then returning back to that, that distribution center. That, that-
Carolyn Trickett: And rescheduling itself if it gets stuck in a traffic jam.
Chris Mason: Indeed.
Carolyn Trickett: One would hope.
Chris Mason: So, you know, these are kind of futuristic things. But they're not, you know, as we think about, you know, what's happened-
Carolyn Trickett: Yeah
Chris Mason: ... with AI over the course of even the last 12 or 18 months, it's kind of coming leaps and bounds. So it's, uh-
Carolyn Trickett: Amazing
Chris Mason: ... it's much the source of wonderment.
Carolyn Trickett: Sean, can you elaborate on how AI might be impacting the world that Essensys works in?
Sean Lucas: Yeah. So it's... Well, if, if nothing else, it's just the, uh, the, the quantum of data and compute power that's, that's gonna be needed in the next sort of, um, near term, right? Sort of next two, three, five years. And I think the big trends that you mentioned at the start, Caroline, around sort of the, the mobility changes and, and some of the key, um, drivers of, of new user behavior. Um, cloud computing's probably almost top of the list, I think, as, as far as that decoupling from, of work from a place. So work being the office or where, where you went to get work done. So I think AI's going to increasingly just continue to drive the expectation that where those applications can, can deliver benefit. So not just sort of, not just used for the, for the, um, purposes of saying you've got an AI-enabled building, but actually sort of drive some outcomes, and preferably those, those being the end user outcomes or the, uh, efficiencies that both Mosstyn and, and Chris have, have touched on as well. Um, we see that becoming sort of almost par for course. And then, um, similarly through our systems and, and our software, um, we're doing something very similar to, I think, what Chris has just mentioned there as far as the data and analytics and, and our data lake just has such, such a depth of, of insights available. Um, again, they need to be sort of scrubbed and, and presented in a digestible way. But we've got sort of insights down to the packet level. Uh, and that can start to tell you how users are interacting with those spaces, on, on what basis. Again, a lot of the efficiencies that both Mosstyn and Chris are trying to deliver on behalf of their clients, right? If, if a tenant's going to say they need half the space at renewal, um, there's a, there's a premium for the flexibility that they may then require moving forward, whether that be meeting rooms or event spaces or, or some sort of agile spaces thereafter. So it's sort of helping our, our clients sort of get their heads around all that, and then manage that in the most sort of efficient and, and adaptable way as possible.
Carolyn Trickett: Now, given that we're talking commercial property, I'd like to pose-
Sean Lucas: Mm-hmm
Carolyn Trickett: ... one last question to our panelists, which is about the dollars. Sean, we'll stick with you for a minute. Can you explain to the audience, what is it, what is it about your product that could either help a commercial asset owner save money or earn money, or both?
Sean Lucas: Or both in an ideal world. Um, yeah, so, uh, I, I think what, what I just mentioned there, it's, it's really about enabling and driving further efficiency. Um, and actually r- right from the sort of outset, I guess you wanna take a view of how do we deliver better leasing velocity and, and speed to market. And I think that the sort of standard, um, sort of buying or transaction cycle of a, of a previously occupied space with fairly long lease duration and, and a 6 or 12 or even 18 month for larger requirement, um, briefs, sort of, uh, getting the options, going and inspecting them. And, and that will remain in place for a particular cohort of occupiers. But increasingly, I think it's sort of people want space on demand, um, whether that be for an hour or two of a meeting room, or for a 6, 12, 18-month project. Or even, as I mentioned earlier, just the, the variability of, of growth, right? You, you don't really wanna sign a, a seven-year lease on a 1,200 square meter floor and then find that you've outgrown it within that first couple of years. So it's, it's supporting our clients with that and then really ensuring the, the digital foundations and the sort of, um, connectivity solutions that they can offer meet the needs of, again, as I mentioned, those sort of enterprise users. And then everyone else should hopefully be able to benefit from that as well. Um, so that's what we're seeing a lot of, both through the rise of, of flex offerings. I think the much touted JLL statistic around 2019 that, that a third or 30% approximately of, of global real estate, or commercial real estate, sorry, will be flexible. I think we, that that trend is still very much sort of in play and, um, our view is it will be asset owners increasingly offering that sort of, that, that middle solution between co-working or one end of the spectrum is flex and sort of a, a, a normal leased or conventional lease solution. It'll be that, that middle type solution that, that will definitely drive a lot of that demand.
Carolyn Trickett: And Mosstyn, you've already mentioned that the main driver for putting in a parking solution is not really as a revenue earner. But can you just help us understand what is the value then to the, to the owner putting in a solution like UP Park?
Mosstyn Howell: Yeah, I think the first part of, uh, the, uh, the answer to that question, Caroline, is, uh, the ROI is really looked at originally around operational processes and the automation. You know, so we're automating the application of a parking, you know, permit. We're, um, got an auto-approval process around that set around some business rules. Um, we're then able to, uh, activate access credentials automatically with the integrations into parking systems or the security systems. Um, and then we're taking payment, um, and, and there's a probably a, a s- a, a bit off that call, uh, which is leakage or, or revenue that's, uh, not being captured by the current solution because of the manual processes. Uh, we automatically block a user that hasn't paid or if, if, um, a failed payment's gone through, uh, so they don't have access from there. And it might be a monthly park, it gets two or three days to actually fix that, but then after the third day, if they haven't fixed their, their payment, they're actually blocked. And that's probably one of the bigger areas in leakage in a parking operation in a commercial property. And I think the, yeah, the, the, the other benefit is, yes, you can create revenue out of it. We've got, um, uh, we've got one customer in particular that was, uh, charging for parking for s- so the other staff that didn't have parking rights in the building. Um, and they were creating revenue through that. So there is definitely revenue coming back to the asset owner and, you know, parking revenue's a really big part of the, of the asset value.
Carolyn Trickett: And Chris.
Chris Mason: Yeah.
Carolyn Trickett: ROI for a, for a traffic control.
Chris Mason: Yeah. So the, the first area that we get involved with is often during the plannings, the planning of a building. So if someone's proposing to build a 50-story commercial tower with 30 or 40 retail and food and beverage outlets, the question we get asked is, how big should the loading dock be? The difference between from a cost of construction and cost of ongoing operation and getting that number right or wrong is pretty significant. So we do a lot of work with the developers right from the get-go with all the metadata that we've got in relation to, here's all the different buildings. We know how long the individual appointments take because we watch things coming in and out. You don't need that many docks, you only need this many. Now, you can then return that space to lettable area. So there's a whole world of science in relation to, and there's a lot of science in relation to how many people fit on the floor of the building. But a lot less science in relation to how many trucks fit into the underground car park, and we've got that science which we can bring to bear. So some really good sort of thinking at the point of the building being kind of built. From an operational side, once the building's kind of built and up and running, then of course we can reduce the number of staff that are needed in the loading docks because we only need to have the loading docks open for how many deliveries are coming in. And we can push those deliveries back into a shorter period of time or in an after-hours environment, have it integrated such that an individual sitting in a control tower somewhere has got access to see the roller doors being opened and closed through the QR code the driver's turning up with. So through lots of automation we can reduce the staff coming out of that. In our industrial space, the capturing of a bunch of information through the booking of the appointment reduces a lot of the manual paperwork, which is very prevalent in the world of kind of some of the way that warehouses operate. There's still a lot of paper manifests and the like being kind of passed back and forth. We can capture all of that and integrate it directly back into those particular systems. With the ability for MobileOK to kind of talk to purchase order systems and kind of only present for the drivers, we only want this purchase order delivered kind of thing, it helps our customers manage their own stock flows and purchasing patterns because they're not allowing the drivers to turn up with the suppliers to bombard them with product. They're only delivering particular purchase orders and particular line items on those. So lots of different angles in relation to the benefits of getting your act together.
Carolyn Trickett: Right. Thank you, guys. I think this has been a very intriguing and entertaining view on some really practical solutions and how useful they can be for our commercial real estate environment. So thank you very much. Thanks to all our attendees. I hope you found this really useful, and we'll see you in another month or two in another proptech panel.
