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What Are The Costs and Benefits of Innovation Within ESG? with Jonathan Flaherty & Philippe Le Fort

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Oct 4, 2022

Summary: In the
fifth episode of season 10 of The Propcast, host Louisa Dickins is
joined by
Jonathan Flaherty, Global Head of Sustainability and Building
Technology Innovation at
Tishman Speyer and Philippe Le Fort, leader of Ambio, a smart buildings SaaS
platform by
PATRIZIA.

Jonathan and Philippe talk to
Louisa about their journeys into ESG and elaborate on the
technologies they believe will help real estate reach net zero.
They discuss the differences in innovation adoption across
geographies and the long term benefits and cost of innovation on
the asset, the tenant and on our built environment.

Philippe talks about how he’s
been leading PATRIZIA’s very own smart building SaaS platform,
Ambio, and both guests share their thoughts on whether full
digitalisation is actually possible.


Resources:

 

Key Insights From This Episode:  

  • I don’t think one particular technology is
    going to drive us to low carbon buildings, it’s going to be a
    combination of everything working together to get that outcome. –
    Jonathan
  • People will go back to offices in the future
    but people need to have a reason to do so, and the traditional
    office product is going to have to change.The buildings that don’t
    make that change are going to become obsolete. –
    Jonathan
  • Customer experience is really significant to
    the focus of companies such as Amazon and Apple. Real estate has
    not paid much attention to that up until now, however technology is
    now coming to change the way people operate and the way people use
    buildings every day. – Philippe
  • I think we’re living in one of those moments
    where all these mega trends are converging together and really
    accelerating how we have to adapt as an industry. –
    Philippe
  • Is any of this digitalisation really possible
    within a brick and mortar business, which is so large, slow moving
    and slightly archaic? – Louis

 

About Our Guests:

Jonathan Flaherty:  

Jonathan Flaherty is the Global Head- Sustainability and Building
Technology Innovation at
Tishman Speyer. Mr. Flaherty joined Tishman Speyer in 2007 as
part of the Leadership Development Program and has held various
roles with the company, including in asset management and portfolio
management for New York. He transitioned to the Sustainability
department in 2010, becoming the Director of Sustainability, and
most recently the Global Head – Sustainability and Building
Technology Innovation. In this role, he manages the firm’s evolving
sustainability strategy: property and fund sustainability
certifications, communication with current and future investors,
worldwide performance tracking, energy procurement strategy,
building technology innovation, diligence in alternative green
investments, and execution of the firm’s commitment to Net Zero by
2050. Prior to joining the firm, he worked as a legislative aide
for Senator Schumer in Washington, DC. Mr. Flaherty is the chair of
the board of directors for the Building Energy Exchange, the
co-chair of the REBNY Sustainability Committee and is on the board
of the New York Energy Consumers Council. He holds a BA in
political science from Kenyon College, and an MBA and MSUP from
Columbia University.

 

Philippe Le Fort:

Philippe Le Fort leads Ambio, a smart buildings Saas platform
by
PATRIZIA. Philippe joined the company in 2020 and has
been in charge of setting up a new business line from the ground
up. Today he is leading its execution and responsible for deploying
the technology at scale across the portfolio, advancing how
buildings perform for businesses, people and the
planet. 

Previously, Philippe was an
Investment Director at Tishman Speyer London and started a proptech
venture to democratise access to institutional grade real estate
using blockchain technology. He has also advised early-stage
companies in the U.S. 

Philippe has a MSc in
architecture from EPFL and an MBA from London Business School. He
lives in London.

 

About Tishman Speyer:

Tishman Speyer is a leading owner, developer, operator and
investment manager of first-class real estate in 32 key markets
across the United States, Europe, Asia and Latin America. We
develop, build and manage premier office, residential and retail
spaces for industry-leading tenants, as well as state-of-the-art
life science centres through our Breakthrough Properties venture.
With global vision, on-the-ground expertise and a personalised
approach, we are unparalleled in our ability to foster innovation,
quickly adapt to global and local trends and proactively anticipate
our customers’ evolving needs.  By focusing on health and
wellness, enlightened placemaking and customer-focused initiatives
such as our tenant amenities platform, ZO., and our flexible space
and co-working brand, Studio, we tend not just to our physical
buildings, but to the people who inhabit them on a daily basis.
Since our inception in 1978, Tishman Speyer has acquired,
developed, and operated 512 properties, totalling 217 million
square feet, with a combined value of over $126 billion (U.S.). Our
current portfolio includes such iconic assets as Rockefeller Center
in New York City, The Springs in Shanghai, TaunusTurm in Frankfurt
and the Mission Rock neighbourhood currently being realised in San
Francisco.

 

About PATRIZIA:

With operations around the
world,
PATRIZIA has been offering investment opportunities in
real estate and infrastructure assets for institutional,
semi-professional and private investors for 38 years. PATRIZIA
manages more than EUR 55 billion in assets and employs over 1,000
professionals at 28 locations worldwide. Through its PATRIZIA
Foundation, PATRIZIA is committed to social responsibility. The
Foundation has helped around 250,000 children in need worldwide
gain access to education and thus, has given them the chance of a
better life over the last 21 years. You can find further
information at
www.patrizia.ag

 

About Our Host

Louisa Dickins

Louisa is the co-founder of LMRE, which has rapidly
become the market leading global PropTech recruitment platform and
search consultancy with operations across North America, United
Kingdom, Europe and Asia-Pacific.

To promote the industry she is
so passionate about, Louisa set up the Global podcast


‘The Propcast’
where she
hosts and invites guests from the built environment space to join
her in conversation about innovation.


About LMRE

LMRE is globally recognised for leading the way in
Real Estate Tech & Innovation talent management.

From the outset our vision was
to become a global provider of the very best strategic talent to
the most innovative organisations in PropTech, ConTech, Smart
Buildings, ESG, Sustainability and Strategic Consulting.

At LMRE we are fully committed
at all times to exceed the expectations of our candidates and
clients by providing the very best advice and by unlocking
exclusive opportunities across our global network in the UK,
Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific.


Timestamps:

[2:10] Jonathan: Talk us through
your role and journey into ESG and how you and Philippe first met
each other?

  • I have been at Tishman Speyer for 15 years this
    week. I started as an intern in the designing construction
    compartment before ending up in the sustainability
    department.
  • Philippe was based in our London office and we
    ended up on a whole bunch of projects together.
  • At the time when I joined the department in
    2011 it was a much different world and sustainability was a much
    smaller corner of the universe. However, I thought it would be an
    increasingly important force in the future.

[4:26] Philippe: Talk us through
your role at PATRIZIA and how it has changed? Could you also give
us an introduction to your SaaS solution product, Ambio?

  • I joined PATRIZIA about 2 years ago in the tech
    innovation team with the mission to improve operations, reduce
    carbon footprint and improve experiences within buildings through
    technology. The topic has been accelerated over the last couple of
    years by the demand for ESG products and for better data throughout
    the industry 
  • We started from the fact that we needed to
    understand our buildings better, understand how good the tech
    infrastructure was and how good it needed to be. We soon realised
    that there was no such tool in the market that did that and we had
    to build one, that’s how we started Ambio which we have just
    launched.
  • Ambio involves doing health checks of
    buildings, identifying opportunities to add value by using
    technology to smarten things up and working with suppliers in the
    market to connect them to our investment managers so that we cover
    the entire spectrum of digital transformation and
    decarbonisation. 

[6:30] Jonathan: What is the
major factor for pursuing ESG at Tishman Speyer?

  • The biggest driver for Tishman Speyer has been
    the long term equity of the business, investors would like to know
    that 10 years from now the building they’re buying today will
    retain its resale value and will still be leasable after future
    regulations have come into place.
  • When buying buildings now you need to be
    thinking about the owner after you and that owner is going to have
    it when all of the regulations related to decarbonisation and low
    energy are going to hit across the world. 

[11:20] Philippe: What’s the big
focus of PATRIZIA in terms of pushing forward on smart
buildings?

  • On one hand you have more demanding capital,
    and on the other hand the increasing expectations from tenants
    which is moving the needle of what people want in terms of
    space.
  • Customer experience is really significant to
    the focus of companies such as Amazon and Apple. Real estate has
    not paid much attention to that up until now, however technology is
    now coming to change the way people operate and the way people use
    buildings every day. 
  • All these mega trends are converging together
    and really accelerating how we have to adapt as an industry. Covid
    has been a very big booster and we’re still trying to figure out
    the implications of that, because there is a lot of elasticity in
    the market.

[14:02] Jonathan: Can you
explain what you mean by a haircut on exit and how this can be
avoided?

  • A building should be worth a particular number
    upon exit based on the rents that you’re getting in that building,
    if the market is valuing your product below that then it is below
    the logical value that the market is assigning to other
    buildings.
  • You need to predict what the market is going to
    look like in the future, most leases last for 10 years, so buying a
    building now you need to be thinking about the market and the
    regulations in 2032. 

[18:30] Philippe: Can you tell
us more about the technologies PATRIZIA are utilising to help
maximise an asset value?

  • Heating and cooling a building is one of the
    biggest energy buckets in commercial buildings, so a technology
    that tracks the weather is really important.
  • Another technology we are looking at is
    predictive maintenance in lifts, predicting when a lift is going to
    break saves money on lift management contracts.
  • Since the pandemic, people are much more
    conscious of the air quality in buildings. Also, to help people
    that are coming back into offices be healthy and productive, we
    need to ensure the air quality is good with regards to the CO2
    concentration affecting brain productivity.

[22:11] Jonathan: Is there
anything you would like to add in terms of which technologies
Tishman Speyers are using?

  • Indoor air quality has been a big focus and
    will continue to be, but if anything that’s more monitoring than a
    technology and has been around for a while. 
  • I don’t think one particular technology is
    going to drive us to low carbon buildings, it’s going to be a
    combination of everything working together to get that
    outcome.

[23:59] Jonathan: what can we do
to get these brick and mortar businesses on board with technology
adoption and ESG?

  • Our primary focus is office buildings, we don’t
    see the end of an office but that the office product needs to
    transform into something that is much more focused on digital,
    hospitality and low carbon. The changes in offices are very large
    and are coming at a rapid rate.
  • People will go to offices in the future but
    people need to have a reason to do so and the traditional office
    product is going to have to change, the buildings that don’t make
    that change are going to become obsolete.

 

L – Touch on
the main 
lessons you have learnt throughout your
career.

Jonathan – You never know where
your career is going to go, you have to be ready for twists and
turns. There are so many opportunities out there so allow yourself
to be flexible.

M – Please give
a
 mention to anyone / product / service.

Philippe – I’d like to mention
Ambio and the team who have worked really hard to launch the
product.

R – What has
been the most  
rewarding  aspect of working in PropTech?

Jonathan – It is enormously
rewarding working in PropTech and sustainability, it is full of
fascinating people doing really interesting work around the
world.

E – What are
you 
excited about in the future of sustainability and
smart building?

Philippe –  I like it when
things are not so straightforward, PropTech and ESG are creating
dislocation and value add opportunities in our industry which is
really exciting.


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