Freeze Pro Software Develops Cloud-based Enterprise Solution for Energy Management & Environmental Monitoring
Company profile
Switch Automation provides innovative software solutions that help in managing energy usage in buildings in order to reduce energy costs and improve overall returns for property owners. With a thirteen member team that has varied experience in the property sector as well as software development, the company focuses on promoting sustainability in building design in order to reduce carbon foot print and utility costs. The products include all in one turnkey solutions, with meters and sensors capability that collect data which analyzed and reports automatically generated. The company’s customers include educational institutions and real estate companies.
Challenge
Switch Automation needed to upgrade the energy monitoring and management platform that they offer to their clients as part of the overall building sustainability solutions product. The previous solution they used required a substantial amount of time and project management personnel for the initial integration. It depended on hardware and did not support multiple users with different levels of access. Customers needed to look at their portfolio in one platform so they are able to compare the buildings to one another, and determine where they will allocate their budget to ensure the buildings are running efficiently.
Solution
As a company first of all we supplied the right technological skills initially it was C#, Silverlight, WPF, MVVM, Windows Azure, SQL Server, SQL Azure. We were working with backend logic and front end display such as UI designers for different kinds of apartment, house or building plans. Included in the team were Microsoft Azure developers. Later on the project shifted to WEB technologies as a core, due to a number of advantages presented by the web platform. The final product was cross platform, using latest Microsoft azure cloud development technology. With the new product, buildings will be able to be managed better, to ensure they are performing efficiently, and there is less need for extra personnel as all data collection, analysis and reporting tasks are automated.
Benefits and End Results
- Freeze delivered a cross-platform solution that gives building managers the ability to view all-important matrices needed to evaluate the return on investment of the property in one screen
- Software developed has the ability to analyze data from various sensors and other hardware and provide a snapshot/report on status of building
- Fully automated system, requiring minimal human monitoring
- New platform can be used as an M&V and ROI tool for any projects they implement within the portfolio
- Information collected from different sensors can be posted on the cloud and shared with consumers to sensitize and engage them about their resource usages and costs.
- Feed ins from external data sources such as weather stations and news sites
- Real-time reporting and data collection