Frictionless and Touchless Smart Buildings

Touchless and frictionless places and spaces are the future.

touchless lockers and frictionless smart buildings

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smart buildings - smart lockers

What is a frictionless and touchless environment?

Architects and Designers  think of friction as any moment that prevents an uninterrupted flow through the built environment, and they try to come up with solutions that can create “frictionless experiences.”  When we return to our physical workplaces, we need to rethink how we introduce interfaces that aren’t just frictionless, but also touchless.

We will need to embrace the need for a touchless office environment to help workers regain the confidence of working at a desk with hundreds of other people at desks nearby.

Pre-COVID-19, a boardroom was typically booked for use through proprietary software on a PC. Temperature is controlled by a wall thermostat. Users adjust lighting by common switches and dimmers. Automatic blinds are controlled by remotes or touchpads. AV equipment is manually switched on by another remote control. Lockers are shared with dumb, pincode touch locks.  All of these are potential infection points when used by multiple people every day. As long as these systems remain separate, they will remain infection points.

To limit the use of shared interfaces, personal devices will become increasingly central to employee interactions with each other and the building itself.

Shift From Shared to Personal Devices

In a touchless office, an employee can use a Bluetooth access reader to open the doors of the building using their phone. They can book meetings, schedule hot-desk assignments and schedule times that they’ll be in the office or working from home from a single app. This app will turn on lights and adjust the room temperature.  And the app will control the lockers – allowing users to select, reserve and even request cleaning of the locker on their personal devices.

Creating Seamless Physical-Digital Systems

In today’s world, the importance of integrating digital and physical solutions is critical to fully deliver on optimal employee/user experiences.

In order to achieve great workplace experiences, the prerequisite is twofold:  First, you need a robust human-centered design strategy addressing the physical, digital, brand, and service design components of a user journey; and second, you need a foundational technology platform that can offer plug and play (seamless integration) functionality for whatever digital solution each unique journey might need. 

What is Human-Centered Design?

Human-centered design is a creative approach to problem solving.. It’s a process that starts with the people you’re designing for and ends with new solutions that are tailor made to suit their needs. Human-centered design is all about building a deep empathy with the people you’re designing for.

Historically, technology was integrated into the buildings in a piecemeal way, with each component living independently from the other. The touchless entry doors don’t talk to the security systems, which don’t talk to the digital signage, which don’t talk to the payment transaction systems and so on. As we look ahead to a more seamless and integrated system, that will change. 

Integration starts with networks. Building automation systems are poised to become the central communication hub of any facility. Building networks are implemented using IP communication with increasing frequency. IP communication is the same network type as computers.

This is all managed through a single, centralized fully integrated software system with an open framework to allow owners and operators to pick and choose which features are most important for them.

Lockers Will Play an Integral Role,

But Not in the Way that Most Think of Lockers Pre-Pandemic

Lockers will play an integral role in the return to the office.  But not in the way that most think of lockers pre-pandemic.  Lockers are essential to personal storage, and providing employees with a sense of security and personal space.  Strict, clean desk policies will necessitate a place to store personal and business items overnight or until the employee is next in the office.  But lockers of the past have used “dumb” pin-code battery locks that are not networked or able to communicate with with apps or other technologies.  So besides being infection points, as previously mentioned, they are not able to communicate with and/or provide those frictionless experiences.  These “dumb” lockers becomes an outlier — something that is not frictionless, with no data on usage and no integration into the overall system.

Smart, networked lockers fully integrate into the overall system.  Use the same RFID credentials that you use with your access control system to access your lockers.  Use the same app that allows you to order a coffee from the company canteen to order or reserve your locker.

MetraModo integrates with your smart building software or custom apps.

MetraModo offers RESTful APIs and other integration methods.  Our locks and platform can be used to easily and fully integrate into your existing smart building applications or to build completely custom or new applications.  And keep in mind, our custom solutions are not only limited to the technology, but also to the physical design of the lockers and the materials available.