Kylie Davis

Discover the power of HID mobile access and revolutionize how you manage your property's security and access systems. Utilizing the HID mobile access app or integrating the solution into your building experience app, your office tenants can enjoy the seamless convenience of using a mobile phone or smartwatch as a credential to access doors, network services, and more.

Kylie Davis

More.

Kylie Davis

The solution will also provide you with valuable data to offer better building services and tenant experiences. So trust Hid for reliable, secure and future ready in building technology that make the hassle of physical security passes a thing of the past. Visit hidglobal.com today.

Kylie Davis

Welcome to the Proptech podcast. It's Kylie Davis here and I'm delighted to be your host as we explore the brave new world where technology, real estate, property ownership, design and construction all collide. It's so great to have you here and to share stories with you of innovation, opportunity and challenges. The aim of each episode is to introduce listeners to a proptech innovator who is pushing the boundaries of what's possible across how we design, build, buy, sell, rent and invest in property and all of the associated behaviors and activities around that. And there's a lot now, none of this would be possible without our sponsors. So a very big shout out to Hid digital identification and building access solutions.

Kylie Davis

Easypay making collecting payments easy for proptex dynamic methods the innovators behind forms live, REI forms live, and Realworks direct connect making moving easy and the Proptech association of Australia thank you for your support of the podcast. Now, have you heard about the push to electrify Australia's residential sector? It's a concerted campaign driven by the australian government to meet a target where 82% of our energy is generated through renewable resources rather than by coal and gas by 2030. And to hit this target, the vast majority of Australia's 12 million existing homes need to switch off fossil fuels and onto solar or wind power. But where on earth do you start?

Kylie Davis

Now?

Kylie Davis

This is something I'm personally looking for at my home, and the options and the adulting required is absolutely exhausting. But my next guest is changing all that. Alex Houlston is the CEO and co founder of Boom, also known as Boom Power, which is an Aussie climate tech business that delivers building electrification needs all in one platform to simplify electrifying homes, help with the decisions, and get access to reliable suppliers while verifying the emission impacts. It's being used by the banking sector to help their customers plan upgrades to homes. And Alex has had an extensive career in the renewable energy sector before starting boom in 2018 and I don't think his timing could have been any better. So here to tell us all about it, Alex Houlston, welcome to the Proptech podcast.

Alex Houlston

Thanks, Kylie. Thanks for having us.

Kylie Davis

It's great to have you here. Now, first question is always the hardest, Alex, what is the boom? Power elevator pitch.

Alex Houlston

So boom is Australia's leading building electrification platform. We make it easy to make the switch.

Kylie Davis

Awesome. So really want to pull this apart because I know energy efficiency in homes is such a big issue right now. Tell us a little bit more detail about how you do what you're doing.

Alex Houlston

Yeah, so Boom is a climate tech business, delivers on electrification needs all within one platform. So it's purpose built software that simplifies that building electrification process, eliminates all the complexity and uncertainty, makes a seamless and effortless decision making process, and able to find reliable suppliers, assess and track your environmental and financial impacts.

Kylie Davis

Okay, so is it for existing homes or is it for new homes or both?

Alex Houlston

It's for existing buildings.

Kylie Davis

Excellent. Okay, so it might not just be homes, it could also be office blocks or anything. Richard, industrial.

Alex Houlston

Yeah, we focus on the hard to reach markets. So homes are the first because households are what we know best. But increasingly, SMEs in particular, where it's really hard to actually get traction with building business owners who just don't have the time or energy to understand what they should be doing.

Kylie Davis

Okay, awesome. So why is this a problem? How big is the problem? Why do we need to electrify our homes and our SMEs?

Alex Houlston

Well, if we go to reach zero emissions, and we'd hope to do it, everyone's saying 2050, but I would have thought 2030 was a better goal.

Kylie Davis

Much better goal. We do not need to be old. Government promises kicking the can down that road.

Alex Houlston

If we assumed that it was going to happen by 2050, let's say, then the grid is increasingly renewable, which means that we're going to end up with most of our emissions coming from the gas appliances within our homes and businesses. And if we just look at the household market, that would mean retrofitting 50 homes every hour, every working hour to say 8 hours a day between now and 2050. So you can imagine if we crunch that then for ten years. Yes. It becomes a much bigger goal. A much bigger problem.

Kylie Davis

50 homes an hour, did you say?

Alex Houlston

It's just a thrilling.