Tim Curran, CEO, Building Engines to Speak on Mergers & Acquisitions Panel at Upcoming CREtech Austin Conference

CREtech, the leading global conference and research company devoted to innovation in the Built World, will be showcasing a panel of the most active companies in the real estate tech M&A space at its first event in 2020. To be held in Austin, Texas on April 22nd and 23rd, the panel will feature Tim Curran, CEO at Building Engines, one of the leaders in the sector. Tim Curran is the CEO of Building Engines, the premier cloud-based building operations platform powering modern CRE. Tim has be…

CREtech Austin To Spotlight Commercial Real Estate Development Companies Leading The Way in Embracing Tech

CREtech (cretech.com), the leading global conference and research company devoted to innovation in the Built World, will be showcasing the leading-edge commercial estate development companies at its first event in 2020. To be held in Austin, Texas on April 22nd and 23rd, the event will feature the largest and most active landlords and developers sharing their companies tech initiatives, overall strategies and predictions on future trends that will impact the commercial real estate industry.

Soft Robotics raises $23 million from investors including industrial robot giant FANUC

Robotics startup company Soft Robotics has closed its Series B round of funding, raising $23 million led by Calibrate Ventures and Material Impact, and including participation from exiting investors including Honeywell, Yahama, Hyperplane and more. This round also brings in FANUC, the world’s largest maker of industrial robots and a recently announced strategic partner for Soft Robotics.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai warns of dangers of A.I. and calls for more regulation

Citing concerns about the rise of deepfakes and the potential abuses of facial recognition technology, Google CEO Sundar Pichai declared in an op-ed in the Financial Times that artificial intelligence should be more tightly regulated: “We need to be clear-eyed about what could go wrong” with A.I., Pichai wrote. The Alphabet and Google executive wrote about the positive developments that A.I. can bring, such as recent work by Google finding that A.I. can detect breast cancer more accurately than …

£20.5M Funding For Planet Smart City

Planet Smart City has secured £20.5m funding. The London-headquartered provider of smart affordable housing secured the investment from existing and new investors, taking the total amount raised since the company’s inception to €100m. The PropTech improves quality of life for residents and fosters communities by providing superior infrastructure, urban planning, sustainability and technological solutions, supported by its Planet app.

I’ve been polluting the planet for years. I’m not an oil exec—I’m an architect

Proptech Startup RealVantage Launches Co-Investment Platform

RealVantage, Singapore’s first online real estate co-investment platform that acquires, manages, and optimises offshore real estate portfolios for accredited investors, founded by a team with institutional investment experience, launched on Jan 16. RealVantage brings accredited investors offshore investment opportunities across various real estate classes and investment strategies. By launching this co-investment platform, both accredited investors and high net worth individuals (HNWIs) wi…

Fifth Wall launches $200m carbon fund in ‘pitchfork moment’

That is Brendan Wallace’s reasoning behind the launch this week of Fifth Wall’s $200m (£153m) Carbon Impact Fund. Speaking to EG, Fifth Wall’s co-founder and managing partner warns that 2020 will be the year everyone realises that, above all else, climate change is “a real estate problem” as he urges the sector to prepare for a “pitchfork moment”. He adds that as the general public, financial markets and regulators become increasingly focused on climate change, real estate – as the single bigges…

Real estate enters the data age

Proptech is the big buzzword in real estate and for good reason: It’s disrupting just about every aspect of the industry and interest is at a fever pitch. Global investment in proptech companies has grown from US$1B in 2012 to US$18B in 2018, according to the latest numbers by Statista. So exactly what is proptech? It’s a broad term that includes everything from data, AI, machine learning, mobile apps and robots to flex office space and co-living residences. At the core of any proptech company, …

2020 vision: predictions for the year ahead (part 10)

I hope that 2020 is the year that our industry can get a handle on all the elements of ESG as more than buzzwords and actually embed them into business strategies. I still see too many organisations viewing sustainability and social impact as discretionary or ‘soft’ when actually, as shown by the terrible fires in Australia, tackling climate change and inequality is of critical importance to all of us. Investors are asking increasingly probing questions around ESG and I expect that will only inc…