BuildingIQ yesterday announced the acquisition of core technology, comprised of the OptiCool and ComfortSENSE subsystems and the interface in-between, from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) for approximately $500,000.
Until now BuildingIQ had an exclusive worldwide license to use and commercially exploit the core technology in commercial buildings as a component of its Predictive Energy Optimization (PEO) offering.
As part of this agreement, BuildingIQ has also obtained all intellectual property rights in the core technology, associated patents and patent applications. The human comfort technology extends the company’s 5i energy intelligence platform.
BuildingIQ president and CEO, Michael Nark, said the CSIRO is one of the largest and most diverse research agencies in the world and was the birthplace of the company's platform technology in 2009.
"Over time we’ve worked tirelessly to enhance the data analysis, learning modeling, and predictive control capabilities of this technology, and it remains a core component of the new BuildingIQ 5i platform," he said.
The acquired ComfortSENSE technology has unique potential to expand BuildingIQ’s data capture and modeling capabilities. The technology was built to provide individual building occupants with a gateway to share information on their comfort level in real-time.
Within the 5i platform, this would essentially allow each person to act as the ultimate building sensor.
"Once incorporated into the 5i platform, this could provide an invaluable data stream for further refinement of BuildingIQ’s already robust thermal, occupancy, and behavior modeling competences," according to BuildingIQ's VP of engineering, Adam Benson.
“The addition of real-time human comfort input will extend our ability to analyze and predict BMS performance and its impact on people," he said.
“Building occupants are the ultimate intelligent sensor in many ways. We’re excited to be able to incorporate the human factor into our platform and ensure that we remain at the forefront of innovation in building energy management solutions.”