The World’s Smartest Office Bldg Is In Singapore

SINGAPORE – TechRadar Pro’s Deputy Editor Mike Moore thinks that the world’s smartest office tower can be found here at the Punggol Digital District, reported the tech news outlet on Sunday evening (20 November, SGT).

“From the outside, JTC Summit may look much like any other office block,” he said. But deep inside the 24-storey commercial property owned by the Singapore government, lies a network of around 60,000 sensors that feeds data to a control centre.

The area, especially the office tower, are ideal for testing the next generation of technology that could potentially power the city of tomorrow, as JTC Summit is close to the Singapore Institute of Technology with its 12,000 students.

For instance, the authorities have created a meticulous 3D digital model of JTC Summit that shows what’s happening across the entire office building in real-time. More importantly, this system called the Open Digital Platform brings together different technologies from building management to smart energy and even robot delivery services.

“This is the Open Digital Platform, which acts as middleware to combine a wide range of verticals alongside infrastructure pillars from network to compute and storage, sharing data across multiple systems to offer everything a smart office building could want via its Smart District OS,” said Moore, who visited JTC Summit.

This platform also allows the landlord to make decisions that range from improving efficiency to just keeping the needed lights on.

This system can monitor nearly every connected part of the office property, providing information on components like lifts, entry gates, and escalators. It also alerts the decision-makers if there’s any issues or breakdowns that need to be fixed.

These components “can be viewed in real-time, meaning managers can spot if a lift is stuck between floors, but also allowing remote control, so that entry gates can be unlocked to allow access to delivery people, or escalators shut down at night time to conserve energy,” Moore explained.

The reach of the platform extends to every room inside the office property, as all of them are installed with smart sensors. This in turn, allows property managers to adjust settings if needed.

For instance, if the CCTV camera detects that a meeting room is overcrowded or the temperature outside the office tower is high, the air conditioning system can be turned up. The utilisation of rooms is also monitored, helping the property managers decide if a meeting can be moved to a smaller venue if there are fewer participants.

JTC Summit’s car parks are also equipped with chargers for electric vehicles (EV). While these chargers pose conflagration risks, the CCTV camera can detect even the smallest puff of smoke, and subsequently sever the charger’s power and raise the alarm before the fire becomes worse.

“JTC Summit is also populated with a number of adorable robots, who are able to carry out a variety of tasks, from package delivery, spotting maintenance alerts, or just patrolling the halls to spot any potential issues.”

“These robots can be tracked in real-time to make sure they don’t get lost or stuck, and can be redirected or halted if a different task or an emergency arises,” explained Moore, who added that Singapore’s government aims to roll out the Open Digital Platform across Punggol district by 2025.