Aulanko Goes Digital
Photos: Pekka Rousi
Futureproofing buildings, communities and cities was one of the big themes at the Annual Convention of Property Investment Prospects in Aulanko, Hämeenlinna, Finland. Hosted on 3 – 4 November, 2016, Finland’ s biggest event for the Finnish real estate business pooled the industry professionals together to talk shop and envision new, brave horizons.
T himon de Jong, an internationally
esteemed expert on future trends, got the ball rolling with key note presentation. He commented that the real estate industry is well positioned to utilise big data to provide customised environments.
“ It is time to say goodbye to‘ one size fits all’ thinking,” he said.
Nevertheless, de Jong doesn’ t believe that digitalisation in itself will solve all problems – in fact, it’ s also creating them, as people spend more time with their phones than with each other. He pointed out that the relevance of social interaction is not extinct, and that flesh-and-blood interaction is making a comeback.
“ Amazon, for example, has launched physical bookstores,” he said, pointing out that finding the right balance is the key here.
Urban IQ
Smart city expert Gordon Falconer was thinking along the same lines with de Jong. The question to ask now is, are we developing future-proof buildings for our children – and how, for instance, can new business models support Smart Cities development? Falconer noted that with regards to the evolution of the cities, one has to respect the current phase of development that the city is in. Smart cities are all about doing more with less – and disruption has a significant role to play in all of this, says Falconer.
But how smart is the real estate market now? Real estate is seen as a very good investment target, which has a tendency to raise the prices – and yield demands are at an all-time low. The risks in the Finnish real estate investment market are considered to be quite manageable, since the market is professional and advanced enough to attract foreign investors. Andrew Allen from Aberdeen Asset Management considers the Finnish price level to be an attractive one, with the Helsinki Region reaping most of the benefits. Beyond the capital, however, also other cities are becoming more and more enticing.
Work 2.0
Talking about the trends shaping the industry, Allen noted that co-working solutions continue to be growing in popularity. This represents a challenge for office-makers: as the ways of working are changing, the concept of office is changing, too.
With the digital tsunami taking hold, new types of threats emerge as well. Mikko Hyppönen from F-Secure probably knows more about the digital threats than any other person in Finland. He commented that as Internet of Things is gaining ground, it’ s important to take a step back and evaluate, what things should be online and what things shouldn’ t. The fact that it is soon very inexpensive to link physical objects into the internet is not reason enough for everything to have an online presence.
Start Ups Shine
At Aulanko, many speakers shared the view that it is up to the real estate industry to create a new kind of ecosystem where data is shared and innovations are developed via partnerships. Real estate sector, though regarded as a rather conservative industry, continues to push the envelope e. g. in energy savings.
Another indication of the turning tides was Pitch Friday where five promising start ups showed their stuff. Making big data work for real estate players seemed to be one strong unifying theme in the presentations – and the winner of the pitching event was SkenarioLabs which provides property owners with forecast data to aid decisionmaking. l
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