GAIN Momentum - Lessons from Leaders in Hospitality, Travel, Food Service, & Technology

​GAIN Momentum episode #66: How Smart Proptech Creates a Five-Star Experience | with Will Gilbert
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Adam Mogelonsky: Welcome to the GAIN Momentum Podcast, focusing on timeless lessons from senior leaders in hospitality, travel, food service, and technology. Our cohost today is Brendon Granger, coming all the way from Australia, Sydney, Australia. How are you, Brandon?
Brendon Granger: I.
Adam Mogelonsky: Good morning. Yeah. And our guest today is Will Gilbert, co-founder of Bodhi.
Will, how are you?
Will Gilbert: Great. Thank.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, so we have two North Americans. One, one Ozzy here. Will, before we go and go back to the beginning of your career and how you came about Bodhi, could you just give us the elevator pitch on what your company does?
Will Gilbert: what we really do is we, we protect, um. Asset for the hotel, which is, uh, they're guests, right? [00:01:00] So by connecting into all the different devices around the property and the, the guest room in, in common area spaces, and acting as a virtual technician throughout the entire property, constantly testing these different systems and.
You know, virtually pressing buttons and seeing how things are responding. Um, you know, we're ensuring, uh, you know, we say a hundred percent guest satisfaction. Uh, you know, what does it cost to move a guest from, uh, one room to another? You know? And especially a negative review is, is not good. So, you know, we we're utilizing our technology to talk to these systems and, and be able to provide, information to the property so that guest has a, has a great five star, uh, experience.
Adam Mogelonsky: Okay, so just for people, uh, devil's at, you know, just. Are you talking about the physical systems, the low voltage systems in the room, or are you just a platform that then is tied into Bluetooth?
Will Gilbert: Physical systems. So, and also software systems. So you know, the physical lighting control, the HVEC, the music systems, you know, we're physically [00:02:00] integrated with all of those pieces of hardware. We're a hundred percent hardware agnostic. Uh, and then we also can do things to ensure. Know, um, a guest service request.
Yeah. Uh, you know, a do not disturb or privacy request actually is working, and those two systems are talking to each other. 'cause as you know, everything is fragmented and they have to talk to each other. So we're the ones that, uh, sit there behind the scenes making sure all that stuff is, is actually happening.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome, and this is very important because this is a whole evolution of hospitality, which is not just protecting the guests, as you said, but also energy management systems as well.
Will Gilbert: Uh, it is, you know, uh. We are always being asked about that return on investment and, and, you know, everyone can provide 35, 45 savings because of a smart thermostat and, and, you know, talking to the PMS and rolling things back and the guest isn't in the room and occupancy and all that kind of stuff.
and we do all of that, a hundred percent of that. Uh, but we just take it further by, you know, talking to all these different devices. Um, and, and, you know, providing a, greater ROI which is not having [00:03:00] that negative review.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome. So now, uh, let's pull it back to where, how you got here. And I don't imagine any kid, in middle school grows up or says, when I grow up, I want to be, oh, the founder of a guest experience, uh, in room technology and, and physical low voltage system supplier and, uh, provider. How, what were the key, what were the broad strokes that led you from. Early career to founding Bodhi.
Will Gilbert: Uh, um, you know, we can, we can talk about this for a while, but I mean, you know, yeah, I, I did start at, at 14. Um, but you know, growing up when I was, you know, six, seven years old, I became really intrigued with, um, this Texas instruments. Programming tape recorder that I, uh, inherited and being able to connect it to a TV and do basic programming and basic the programming language.
And, you know, I was lucky enough to have parents that, you know, in invested in computers for me growing up, and I was absolutely fascinated with them. I go to the, you know, when I was six, [00:04:00] seven, you know, again, six, seven years old, going to, you know, the library to get books to go, come home and, and type programs and, and learning every aspect about how this stuff, uh, kind of worked.
that's where it really started. And then, um, you know, coming into, you know, I was 11 years old, 12 years old. Um, I started off with one of my, I guess what technically like a, a company. Uh, it was a, a bulletin board service. And that was back in, people would, would dial in and people could, could connect over the phone line, interact with the text space screen to send messages to each other to download software.
My bulletin board service, uh, became extremely popular because I had all sorts of software and, uh, and things people could download. And for my 12th birthday, my parents, uh, gifted me a second phone line. So I became a one of the first dual line, uh, BBSs. And that's actually how I met, uh, one of my first, uh, partners to this day.
Uh, he was one of the 3000 users that I had. And he was just a couple grades older than in, in high school. So, um, yeah, so fast forward, you know, back to that, that 14-year-old side, that's where I really started working, for an internet provider. And I didn't really [00:05:00] look at it as a, as a job. Uh, you know, I'd go to that office after going to school during the day and, you know, they have a list of customers for me to talk to and they'd wanted to talk to me because they wanted me to come out and configure things and help them with software services and, uh, provide them a, a great experience.
That's actually how I met my, my third partner, uh, was hired by his dad to go write software for, for his company. And so, you know, for me, I never looked, really looked at as, as working for people. Um, you know, these people wanted services and solutions I could provide again, you know, customer experience. Um, and I didn't want anything to be between me and the customer.
So, you know, the only way to way to ensure that was to have a direct connection to them with my own businesses. And, you know, that just parlayed into. Different businesses over the years. and getting into the, you know, ultimately the hospitality business from everything we learned the past 20 years, uh, in system integrations.
Adam Mogelonsky: Okay, so the next part of this is that you've founded companies in three different countries. Is that correct?
Will Gilbert: Correct.
Adam Mogelonsky: How has that changed your perspective on the nature of [00:06:00] business?
Will Gilbert: Um, there's actually more countries now, uh, but uh. As far as operating on a, on a global scale, uh, you know, the largest issues obviously navigate are, are government regulations, employment, uh, restrictions. Uh, one of the reasons that we were highly successful, uh, in our systems integration business, is because we always had local people, uh, to provide instant support.
Um, you know, this would push out companies, you know, from the market that were having to fly people in, uh, to provide that support. And again, this goes back to hospitality, you know, the customer needs instantaneous response. Um, and so that was, you know, one of the things that we learned on that global scale of, of you have to be there.
Uh, you can't just have an office. You need to have people there need to be servicing the customers.
Adam Mogelonsky: So now let's go forward to Bodhi and getting to the founding of Bodhi. And of course everyone likes to talk about the founder's myth and this whole idea of the Aha moment. But the other part of that is everyone has these great [00:07:00] ideas, but then how do you know that they're actually the idea of many. So what was your aha moment for Bodhi and when did you know that it was an actual business, not just something that you forget about the next week?
Will Gilbert: so. Coming from that systems integration world, uh, we were always starting a new project, uh, making different devices, uh, talk to one another, uh, modifying programs and modules over and over again. Uh, no matter what, you know, new projects were always a custom program, custom integrations, uh, and there was no real way to, to manage all these devices.
And we had a project. in 2010, that's actually where Bodhi really started was back in 2010. The company didn't start till 2020, but the software, you know, I look at Bodhi today, we're on our probably fifth generation, right? Ba basically based upon coming from, uh, from 2010. And we had a, a really high end mixed use condo, hotel.
they had all these sorts of different systems in it, and we really saw the need, [00:08:00] you know, for that single pane of glass, uh, to manage everything. and that's where we started, uh, uh, building, um, you know, there was nothing commercially available to tie it all together for a property manager. Uh, and, you know, again, to ensure that 5-star guest experience, these, these customers were, were flying in spending.
tens of Thousands a dollars a night. Um, and they couldn't show up to units that weren't working. that's where Bodhi was born,
Adam Mogelonsky: Okay, so we're at present day now, and we're talking really about a connected room. Is that correct?
Will Gilbert: correct?
Adam Mogelonsky: Okay.
Will Gilbert: A time now, but yes.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah. Give us a visual. What can you. Connect into a connected room.
Will Gilbert: Really anything. Now, obviously if you go into a room and it has regular, you know, dumb light switches and a dumb thermostat, you're not gonna get much from. You can connect every aspect, meaning from the end, second, you open that door, you know, that lock mechanism, you know, being online, talking back to the system, [00:09:00] to walking into the room and being picked up by an occupancy sensor or a thermal sensor.
Uh, turn the lights on and off, you know, something that motorized window treatments, you know, no one cranks, you know, a crank in their car to put the windows up and down. They press a button for those shades to go open and close windows. The motorization of the window treatments. Uh, and then in the more, uh, you know, higher end, you could have, uh, audio video systems as well.
Of course you always have the in-room entertainment with the television. Uh, so every aspect in that room, is connected or can be connected.
Adam Mogelonsky: One area that I really like is circadian lighting.
Yeah. And. I'm wondering if we could pick out this thread here. One aspect of Bodhi is you have preferred partners that you're gonna work with that integrate into your system. Walk. Walk me through, I'm a prospective hotel owner and I wanna do circadian lighting because I'm big on sleep.
What would be your thought process in guiding that execution upon that, that [00:10:00] dream and that demand?
Will Gilbert: Okay, perfect. Well, you know, to start, obviously we're a hundred percent manufacturer agnostic. Um, but what we do is to, you know, this is a pretty detailed point, but, um, you know, we have customers coming to us asking, who should we use? What should we use? And we always ask them, well, what whatcha trying to.
Deliver. So if someone were to come and say, we wanna deliver, you know, a circadian rhythm experience in the guest room, we would say, okay, well these different manufacturers have that, that technology and that capability. So, you know, like a Crestron or, or a Lutron, have that built right into their control systems.
So what Bodhi can do is, um, and can connect to it. So you can actually see and get data and analytics from all those kind of things. Uh, but those, you know, SAR rhythm is really based upon time of day, outdoor daylight, all that kind of stuff. Um, that's built. Control system. So we would, you know, navigate that and them hardware to use.
And then bohi is used on to make sure all it working.
Adam Mogelonsky: Okay. Yeah, I mean that's, uh, that's a very specific use case, but I like how you walk, walk me [00:11:00] through it and, and it's like, it's all about how you start from the guest and what the guest wants, and then, and then go back to having the hardware and the connected software fulfill. That that guest experience.
Will Gilbert: or turn it off. Maybe they, you know, one guest wants that in that room that day and someone else doesn't want any of that stuff, you know, and being able to easily, uh, turn it off and that's something actually Bodhi does really well, uh, especially in, in, in condo hotels, you know, during the year when it's a hotel.
All the regulations, all the code compliance aspects function when the room is now being used or the, the condo is being used as a, as a tenant occupied space for half the year, all those things get turned off. Um, so we're able to give the best of both worlds, by talking to systems.
Adam Mogelonsky: Talking to all the systems. That comes down to the dreaded I word of integrations, and that's a whole nightmare. Both choosing who you want to integrate with and then actually doing the development work. how do you balance that?[00:12:00]
Will Gilbert: So. the one thing well I need with different, different manufacturers and, and newer ones that we've integrated with, uh, is we always explain to them that, because they'll ask me, why do, why do we be on your platform? What's, what's the benefit? Well, I say, well, the more you can expose to us, uh, in your hardware, and I've used this example before, but say you manufacture motorize, uh, window treatments, if you can give us information from that motor, if there's a.
A reverse torque sensor and a voltage drop or something like extra details where we can use that data to be able to do more in-depth testing and again, more than just offline, online. Um, then, with that data, uh, we, we can do so many more things. And so, you know, we go to this manufacturers, we don't use any hacky APIs.
Everything that we use is all published. Um, you know, we do all the integrations. Um. Internally so we don't outsource anything. Um, you know, we're constantly watching as the manufacturers change [00:13:00] software versions and revisions and stuff like that. And we have an in-house lab here. We literally have a room that has every manufacturer's piece of equipment, uh, that we're able to, to test, to test against all the time.
So when something happens, you know, all, you know, a PMS software version might upgrade in that. Disconnect something here and there, and we're able to be able to connect that, tell that property that, hey, this is down. We, we fix things within, within minutes. So we only do that by the integrations that we have and by, you know, having those peer integrations where we're not doing anything behind the scenes, you know, all the manufacturers know how we talk to their stuff.
Some manufacturers give us some extra insight, like I was mentioning, into their equipment.
Adam Mogelonsky: That's cool. Do you wanna, do you wanna flip the camera on to show us the lab?
Will Gilbert: It.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah. Okay. So, uh, l looking back at the guest experience, I mentioned one specific want or demand around the circadian lighting, but. You mentioned another one, which is this whole condo hotel and how you can switch between them.
And really what we're seeing is [00:14:00] technology companies like Bodhi enabling new types of hospitality and mixed, mixed use cases, spaces. Uh, are there any other ones that you see as trends that are emerging that you're helping fulfill?
Will Gilbert: Yeah. Um, and I stole this, you know, phrase from somebody else, but, you know, uh, hospitality isn't spelled H-O-T-E-L, you know, hospitality is anywhere a guest can be. And something that we're working on right now is, uh, in healthcare. You know, when you're at a hospital, you're really a. Guest at that, stay.
And, um, you know, one of the largest problems you have that in a, in a hospital environment. Is being able to rest and sleep and, and heal. Uh, and so being able to, to do things like, um, you know, from that guest app or that button in the room to request, I wanna sleep for the next two hours. And of course the, the nurse gets that request.
Make sure that's okay for anything, you know, upcoming whatnot, and, and being able to do things like that. So for us, you know, we're looking at, the guests from different aspects. Uh, so, so uh, healthcare is one of them. and then, you know, moving into the multifamily space, [00:15:00] you know, tenants. Our renters are, are guests, uh, as well.
there's more and more things that need to be done, uh, for those people. You know, it's all been developed in the, in the hotel environment and it's really moving into these other areas where people, you know, stay and sleep.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome. One thing I want to ask about, because we are talking about data that may involve monitoring how people are using a space. Compliance with things like GDR. What's your, what's your thoughts on that?
Will Gilbert: Uh, it's good.
We do is we outside consultant. That we work with, which is important because you can go and do. GPDR, uh, you know, requirements and, and look at what's all done and, and, make it a manual process. The only problem with that is, is uh, tests and things change and requirements change. You have to be constantly on top of it.
So we partnered with a very, large software, uh, company that, uh, is constantly analyzing. [00:16:00] Uh, all of our systems, I mean, literally from our, uh, our software, uh, source code, the way it's stored, uh, the way, uh, our employees, uh, you know, all the encryption on their computers and all of that. And so the cool thing by, by using these services, outsourcing it, is that I.
One, it's constantly testing it. Two, you can do multiple, uh, areas of compliance. So DPDR is just one. There's also, so two, type two is big, uh, for our industry, ISO 27,001. And a lot of times these things blend together. So if you check a box in one area, you can check a box in a couple others. Um, and so by, you know, using these, uh, these consultants and vendors, uh, not only are we able to, to ensure the, the, the compliance with these different, uh. know, organizations, but, uh, uh, we can also audit against it as well. So, uh, they help, you know, doing yearly or quarterly audits, uh, on that data. So not only are we saying that we have things, we can actually prove it.
Adam Mogelonsky: So, yeah. Where I was going with this whole idea of data is, is that every [00:17:00] hotel. Or travel companies looking at how they're streaming data to then put it against, uh, some, some sort of, some form of algorithm to refine their business and, and either for personalization or analytics. where's, where's it going?
How does bode's data fit into the larger picture of analytics and other algorithmic business models?
Will Gilbert: Yeah. And, and for years now, you know, people wanted to be able to have preferences. Right now there's really no, in all the different PMSs, there's really no structured way to, to store these things. Everyone does it a little bit different, which makes it really, really challenging. But what we do is, one, we don't store, uh, personal identifiable information from the guests on, on Bodhi.
Uh, we have, uh, you know, unique IDs, uh, back to the PMS. Um, so all the data that we, you know, we are storing is, is not able to be, you know, traced back to you. you know, the hotels would love it. So they get start anticipating things. Um, you know, we will get there because what we can start doing is, [00:18:00] Comparing the, the guest profile to what we have stored and, and making a good assumption that it is actually, actually them. But it's gonna take some time. Again, like I said, the, the way the data structures are done right now, um, aren't that great. Um, you know, for us, we're using the data more for building the next generation, like all of our, our AI and, and, and dashboards and things.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome. And I mentioned this earlier about energy management and sensors, but sustainability is, it's a huge issue going forward, and every hotel is concerned about it. And I see it now in areas like group RFPs. They wanna know about what your energy standards are and how you're being more sustainable.
Where does, uh, could, could you? Just unpack a little bit more about how Bohi helps hotels meet sustainability goals and and saves energy.
Will Gilbert: Yeah. Um, you know, obviously we have all the, all the data coming in. So the, the more sensors, the more devices, the more data that we have, whether it's, you know, water flow utilization, uh, energy [00:19:00] utilization, all those, uh, uh, door, windows, left open, humidity levels, all we have, all of that, uh, all of that stuff coming in, uh, you know, what we do with it is, is the next part of it.
So, you know, we've had a lot of requests to, to kind of gamify the data. So as a guest in a hotel, being able to say, oh, good job. You only use this many gallons of water today. You think, you think you could do better tomorrow? And, we have an incentive for you. Uh, if you did. Another part that we're, that we're using, and this is not really sustainability, but it kind is, is um, you know, a lot of times you'll leave a hotel at, you know, four or five in the morning and never check out, and that room sits there unoccupied and they can't, you know, flip that room until, you know, one o'clock.
And that's, That, that's not good for, for the business side of things. and, uh, so what we're able to do is since we're tied in with the PMS, we know when that, that that checkout is supposed to happen and we can look at things like when the last time a light switch got touched, right? So if we know that the bathroom light turned on at four 30 in the morning, and then at five 15 the door opened and closed to the entrance.
That, you know, we can send a text [00:20:00] to the guest. This goes back to the kind of the gamifying part of it. Text to the guest and say, Hey, did you check out already? Or did you, did you leave? And if you did, that's great, we'll give you a, you know, a 10% credit or something like that. and that's been something we've been getting requests for more and more the past.
Really Six months. Mm-hmm.
Adam Mogelonsky: That's a very interesting use case. And until you mentioned the text that you would send, my question was gonna be about, uh, false positives, about, you know, those edge cases where somebody, uh, is just going to the gym and then they come back and their room's being cleaned and they're like,
they're in their gym gear.
Will Gilbert: Right. No. We, we double, we double check. It's like everything we do, we do everything is, we don't assume much.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah. But, uh, you know that that's a very interesting use case that demonstrates the whole in terms of more efficient processes, whether it's energy controls, as well as how that could then tie into the ops platform like a Hot Sauce or Alice, where you are, uh, dynamically rearranging, uh, staff [00:21:00] schedules for cleaning rooms. That's case. Uh, do, do you have any other ones that are like that? Uh, really the, the small to demonstrate the, the whole.
Will Gilbert: I mean, the other part of it is, uh, you know, since we have all this data coming in, we can do, you know, uh, submeter billing, you know, and that gets important. Uh, you know, we've, that one property of ours, uh, in the middle of the Palmas on our Rhode Island, you know, they have to store water. They, hey, there's things that, even though it's super high end.
They still have to, you know, uh, calculate and, and see what is is required. And so by able to, by being able to sub-meter, we're able to not only, you know, see what the guest is using, uh, but in some applications, be able to build them for that. as well. When you start getting billed for, for things, you start looking at it a little bit differently.
You know, you're not just paying the, the room rate. Now you're actually paying for utilization.
Adam Mogelonsky: Wow. that's a really cool one. Another, uh, one. And when we did our research here prior to coming on, uh, we talked about the Norman's K [00:22:00] development because you mentioned Bahamas, uh, with Fort Partners. So could you walk us through that specific
project and how you're.
Will Gilbert: Uh, and, and that's, that project is a really good example of, of how far, Bodhi can do, uh, can go. So, uh, Norman's is a remote island, like I said, in, uh, in The Bahamas. the actual ownership group owns many four Seasons properties, and they started this one, uh, as their, as their own branded property.
But you know, they come from a very. You know, high set bar, from what they've established with their four sequence properties. the problem is, is that you can't just have someone arrive in five minutes to solve a problem. Right? Uh, it's a multi, you know, a couple hundred acre island, but it's not a piece of, it's not symmetric geography, you know, it's an island.
So to get from it might only be two miles, but it could take an hour. To get there. Right? you know that that's the perfect use case for Bode. So we're integrated into every aspect of that property. Uh, the door locks you know, there's a lot of different villas there. All the smart tech in those villas [00:23:00] between, uh, not only the, you know, all the, all the same stuff, the lading control systems, HVAC and all of that.
But we have other things too, like, you know, water leak sensors because there's, you know, water heaters, uh. You know, uh, stored in very compact areas and, um, uh, humidity is a big thing, uh, obviously in the Caribbean, you know, being able to, to manage that and, and other things too. Just like, you know, it's the middle of nowhere.
Uh, if a door is left open more than say, I don't know, 10 minutes or 20 minutes, you might want someone to know about that, to, you know, to go check it. Um, and we also do things, you know, um, like monitor, you know, battery levels in different devices, like those door sensors. We're able to provide that staff, you know, not only the alerts and intelligence of what's going on, but we're also able to give them, you know, time to plan because again, it takes time to get parts to replace things in, in the middle of nowhere. So it's nice to see a forecast and trend of how things. Uh, or are happening.
Um, and then, you know, at that property, we're really taking it to the next level. So they have a, uh, a private airport, and we are, [00:24:00] um, integrated with the, the, the wifi system for the entire property. So, um, this is something that's coming, but when the, the guest lands and the wifi sees that person's device that it knows, we're able to say, welcome back to the island.
Here's a, here's that link to open your door, control your stay, and do everything you wanna do while you're here. You know, no app to install, nothing to, to fumble with. We're being ahead of the game when that, you know, that guest gets there. You know, imagine, you know, walking into a hotel instead, having to go to check in or do something, you know, on the app yourself to go mobile, check in all the, we're sending you that text, we're doing it.
we're we notice that you're there. Um, and, and we're providing that experience. Yep.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, the geo, uh, geofencing, I guess, of the whole experience. So that is a, that is ground up involvement and property wide, a lot of hotels are already built, so we're talking about conversions and potentially breaking down walls to install. New wires going [00:25:00] different places. How do you help hotels in that regard with guiding them through a conversion or a renovation to get them up to speed with the smart tech while also keeping costs, where they need to be?
Will Gilbert: So couple answers to that. Uh, the one I wanna really talk about is we had a very high end property in, in New York that just, that just reopened and, uh, you know, they were facing the aspect of having to, they, they had, uh, some smart tech in the rooms, uh, but it was no longer supported. And they were looking at having to spend millions of dollars, in hardware and time to rip these systems out and replace them.
But we are able to go in there with our software. And breathe the life back into these systems and get them up and running so that hotel could open. And that way the, the ownership can now stage their capital expenses of, you know, four or $5 million over the next few years to upgrade these rooms as they need and not have to take all these things outta service.
So, you know, so Bodhi right there, you know, providing a [00:26:00] tremendous value to, on the, the software side. Again, that's an example where there's already some smart tech installed in the hotel. Um, but, you know, coming into, you know, retrofits for us are by the way, are, are, are huge, you know, so coming into a hotel where they're doing a renovation, um, depending on how they're doing, doing their re renovation, but they are required, you know, to come up to local code.
And that means that they need to most, you know, places comply with, if the guest is not in the room for 45 minutes, the lights need to turn off, the AC needs to roll back. All these things have to happen. And for the property, they're trying to, you know, attain that with spending the least amount of money possible.
So we're able to go to them and say, Hey, look. You can go and use this product line, of these, you know, in-wall products that you don't have to rewire the room. We can put these smart dimmers in, uh, from a very high leading manufacturer that you can actually go buy at Home Depot and for, you know, hundreds of dollars and, you know, less than a thousand dollars a guest room.
Not only can you comply with all the code requirements. By utilizing Bodhi, can also provide that guest [00:27:00] experience. So the, the guest app, being able to have all these different controls that the guests can use. You're not having to go and invest, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8, $10,000 into a room. You're able to do it with, you know, uh, very simple hardware and then pairing it with the, the Bodhi software to make it all work.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, and what, what I like is that just the dimmer switch example, that can be more impactful from the guest perspective than a lot of the more expensive finishing materials that you may want to use to upgrade a room. Particularly you're talking New York, uh, you know, building luxury union labor that can be quite expensive when you're talking about an actual renovation instead of just going and swapping in wired in units.
Will Gilbert: You can get the scope cut down to just, you know, different few subcontractors. It makes it way easier.
Adam Mogelonsky: Wow, that's awesome. So, another, uh, partnership I wanna discuss is with Amazon Alexa and, uh, I guess that's Amazon Alexa Smart Properties. What, what exactly is [00:28:00] this? Product that Amazon is launching, and how do you tie in with it?
Will Gilbert: It's a, uh, relatively new, uh, collaboration. But honestly, we've been working with Amazon, the Amazon Alexa team. They've kind of renamed it, uh, over the years, but we've been working with their team, as they navigated that landscape. Uh, and, and I call it non-home owners occupied space. Uh, meaning where you can't just, you know, put Alexa in, connect a user profile to it that connects back to their Amazon account.
It needs to actually be. you know, privacy driven and, and non linking to a, to a person in particular. Um, and so that relationship with them is, is, has been great. Um, you know, Bodhi acts really as the bridge or the glue. For the Alexa voice service, uh, to be able to control things like lighting and HVAC television shades.
Um, you know, really without Alexa having to know anything about the interface or the protocol. So Amazon doesn't have to do all these integrations. You know, there's that wording and integrations. All these different hardware manufacturers Bodhi's already done it. So [00:29:00] we, we get that request. So you go and say, Alexa, turn the lights on, that Alexa gets, uh, Amazon gets the request.
Amazon sends it to Bodhi. Uh, we know what room it's coming from because there's a unique identifier to that Alexa device. But there's a personal data and depending on what's installed in the room, you know, it could be a, Lutron light or a Crestron light or a reco or someone. We tell that light to turn on and it all happens within 200 milliseconds.
It's near instantly fast. So, you know, we're providing, uh. Tremendous service, to Amazon there, you know, not having, have them have to integrate to all these different devices. Um, and you know, the Alexa itself does not have to do any communications locally. It just sends that request to Bodhi and we handle it from there.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome. Yeah. This really is the, the smart room. We have voice to integrated partner to room controls, to personalized fulfillment of whatever the room setup needs to be. what's on the horizon for the next two to two to five years?
Will Gilbert: Um, [00:30:00] obviously ai, everyone's all got ai. and, you know, talk, going back to the data, I'm sure you can imagine all the data that we've collected, uh, over the years, and really more importantly, the data is on the operational parameters of equipment in the rooms. Uh, the big one being HVAC. You know, for us, we have a.
A dashboard like everybody else has a dashboard. Uh, although ours looks, you know, way more sexy and can drill down into a breadcrumb on the floor, uh, and also a, a normal person can operate it. but we always tell people, you know, at, at trade shows and in person that, you know, if we do our job right, uh, you don't need to live on another dashboard looking at things, you know, we're bringing information to you when it's actually needed.
And that's exactly where we're positioning, uh, our ai. So we have a. A multi approach to it. first we started off with all the generative, uh, ai, meaning, um, being able to, uh. Send a text you or a message to you and, and say, there's a problem. And from the data that it, it's looking at. And from the other [00:31:00] aspect is being able to have a conversation with your property.
So through our dashboard, you know, being able to go in there and asking the property, Hey, you know, how many check-ins did this room have? Uh. In the past 30 days without having to go to PMS and do all these data reports, we have that answer within a, within a second. Or we can say, you know, what's the average, uh, uh, runtime of cooling, uh, in this space?
You know, because we've heard some, some complaints, or maybe Bodhi has told us that, uh, it's not cooling, uh, as effectively. So really, you know, the GPT approach is, that conversation. Starting a conversation, um, with your property, and then that, uh, that same aspect is, uh, being rolled out into our guest app.
You know, again, going back to those kind of texts where we can actually say to the guest, Hey, how's your stay going? You know, is your room comfortable? How's the temperature? And if the guest says. It's great, but my room is kind of warm. not only can we go and set the temperature back and try to correct that issue, but we can start going and looking at data and also notifying the property that, hey, this guest has this [00:32:00] issue.
But, you know, right off the bat, we can do something without having to involve a member of staff, of the property. 'cause you know, they're, they are, tax really high right now on, on trying to find people to, to work in these areas. So, um, you know. Another challenge that we, we've given ourselves on the, on the AI side, uh, is that our product is, is global.
it's really easy to go throw in and tie to, uh, an Amazon AI agent or a Microsoft something or, uh, open ai. Um, but for us, even though we're cloud-based, we're, we're portable. Meaning that we can run in private clouds, uh, within government restrictions that don't allow a connection to maybe Microsoft or AWS.
So we have to do this data processing, um, internally. so our next thing that we'll be doing is, uh, I call it. Special Agent Bode. Um, it's really our, it's our machine learning aspect. But again, to put some simple terms to it, it's, it's that special agent living, uh, behind the, the cloud of data and watching things as they, as the data comes in and comes out and being able to make, uh, predictions, [00:33:00] based on what it's seeing, uh, and then special agent Bode can then utilize Bodhi GPT to send those messages in a real simple way saying, Hey Adam, you know, I noticed that.
This room is not cooling as effectively as as everywhere else. And here's a couple steps, how to fix it if it doesn't. If that doesn't help, come back and talk to me and I'll try to help you some more.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, that's, that's, that's really cool. The whole idea of machine learning based on what I imagine now is millions of data points. do you have that in beta?
Will Gilbert: We actually, uh, showed off, uh, the GPT function at ISC in Europe, uh, in Barcelona, back in January. So that's, uh, that's out at at High Tech this year. We'll be not to, but High Tech this year will be showing off all aspects of the, of the AI rollout,
Adam Mogelonsky: Wicked. Uh, yeah. For everyone listening, uh, ISE Integrated Systems Exhibition.
Big show. Exhibition. I think that's what it
stands for, right?
Will Gilbert: systems, Europe integration
systems.
Adam Mogelonsky: Europe, okay. Yeah. Yeah. But it is an exhibition, so.
Will Gilbert: Yes. I think they had,
Adam Mogelonsky: I got a consolation prize there.
Will Gilbert: yes. Yes. [00:34:00] I think they had 60
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah. Awesome. Brendan, any other points, uh, to close out our conversation?
Brendon Granger: Yeah, we'll, um, predictive, um, you know, maintenance, I suppose, as you said, um, on property staff are stretched. With all the data points that you're collecting now, um, is Bodhi able to sort of, you know, send out a warning to the property that, you know, we've had this type of fault in this room. Um, obviously something needs to be done before it actually breaks.
Will Gilbert: Yeah. And, and that all comes from the amount of data that you have, um, you know, and not having to assume as much. So the more data you have, the, the better you can do with that. And the number one thing there, I. Go back to HVAC, but obviously we work with a variety of sensors and manufacturers, but we also manufacture a couple things.
We didn't really, we don't really mention that that much 'cause we're a software company, but we have manufactured a couple things out of a need. Um, [00:35:00] and one of those devices is actually a little box that goes into the supply air duct of A-H-V-A-C unit. Uh, it also connects down to a little, a little float switch, uh, in a drip pan.
So it does two things. One, we're watching the supply air, so we're able to actually. Tell the property proactively that yes, this room is still cooling or heating, uh, the guests might not notice that there's a problem, but there is a problem. And in the next few days, you need to get this unit, uh, uh, serviced.
Um, and then also by tying with the condensation, uh, area there too, if there is some sort of a drip happening, we're able to then take that information and let them know as, as well. And it's a hundred percent agnostic to the manufacturer of HVAC, so you could actually have four different brands of, uh, air conditioning systems in your property.
We put our little box in and it brings back these data points that are extremely useful, for the property.
Brendon Granger: Wow.
Adam Mogelonsky: It's getting Yeah.
Predictive maintenance. Yeah. Is the, is
Will Gilbert: It truly is. Know everyone mentioned that term a lot, but this really is predictive maintenance.
Brendon Granger: That's what we need. Um, [00:36:00] definitely, um, just also obviously on reporting. It's, it's a big one here in the Australian market. mandatory, um, sustainability reporting just being introduced for, for larger, You mentioned, obviously, can you get to the consumption?
Will Gilbert: Yep, we can. So we actually have, there's a lot of countries now that are, that are requiring, um, sometimes up to every five minutes of data points, of consumption. Um, so we do. Two different ways. one way that is super simple is that, you know, since we're talking to say the lights in the room, um, when that room is being designed, you know, they have, you know, the wattage of the lights.
We go ahead and plug that wattage in and bohi to that light switch. Since we're, we know where that, you know, maybe it was dimmed to 50% or a hundred percent or different scenes in the room, how the scenes have been actuating. Uh, we then calculate, we also type in the, the cost per kilowatt. And then we calculate, you know, it's really simple math to figure out the, uh, the usage of these [00:37:00] areas.
And if you wanna get into actual data, we can integrate with, you know, CT clamps, you know, those clamps that go on and measure current flowing. Um, but you know, with Bodhi we can calculate it. We can even look at HVAC and say, you know what, okay. You know, uh, an, uh, an air conditioning unit that uses a, you know, a, a heating element draws a certain amount of kilowatts, but we know how long that heating element was was on for, we know what it was drawing.
So we can calculate that. So literally from our dashboard, you can go and hit energy report at the various high level. And that's one big thing that that's different, Bodhi than everybody else and set us apart, is that we talk to the entire property. So you could have the branded residences on the top floor, the hotel rooms here, and the common area space here.
When I hit that energy report, I get. All of that and built into it. I can drill down into an individual room and see what makes up the, uh, the consumption for the entire property.
Brendon Granger: You mentioned, uh, gamifying that will have you got clients that have done that yet? Did actually present that data to the guest and, and give them a thumbs up because they're doing a good [00:38:00] job.
Will Gilbert: we're starting to, uh, it's, it's relatively new. Yes. Uh, but you'll be seeing that much more this year. Yes.
Brendon Granger: Interesting. It'd be interesting to see from a guest point of view if, uh, if they like it or don't like it.
Will Gilbert: I mean, what we, what we, started off first was with that checkout, you know, asking you, Hey, did you check out checkout yet? that was really, 'cause that's usable across the board, you know, just knowing that door open and closed and that sensor or those lights, switches were, were touched.
Brendon Granger: Fantastic.
Adam Mogelonsky: Will, um, it has been fantastic to learn about the future of access. Controls, interim management, predictive maintenance. Are there any other closing thoughts you might have?
Will Gilbert: I mean, from a, from a, you know, a business point of view, um. You can have the, the best technology out there, know, does things that no one's ever considered. Uh, however, you know, if you start with the technology first, which we, we always try that, you know, going back to acronyms and things, [00:39:00] you know, uh, if you start with technology first, you're on the wrong foot.
You know, you have to start with the customer experience first and then work backwards, uh, to the technology. and when you do that, um, it's the best way to start is with that customer experience first.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah. And that is a, a true timeless lesson. Will. Thank you so much for coming on the show. It's been a very powerful 40 minutes.
Will Gilbert: Thanks, Adam.
Adam Mogelonsky: Thanks.
Brendon Granger: Thank you.