IoT in Energy Management with Autani’s Scott Metker

Autani is an energy management solutions company at the forefront of utilizing the Internet of Things (IoT) and Bluetooth sensors to transform how business owners are managing their energy consumption. With a vast variety of wireless solutions from smart thermostats to control systems—Autani has an answer to every building owners’ HVAC needs. At LightFair in Chicago this year, MarketScale caught up with the Chief Operating Officer of the company, Scott Metker, to get a better understanding about modern energy management and what the future holds for both Autani and the energy solutions industry.

Interoperability is the name of the game in industrial IoT according to Metker.

“There’s a real emphasis this year with people having their systems interoperate with different control systems and schemes,” he said.

More and more energy solutions companies are beginning to implement technologies and products that are compatible with different vendors. Autani has embraced the idea of interoperability in their own products by partnering with companies like Inventronix and Universal that use components interoperable with LG and Phillips components—a true reflection of changing consumer needs, says Metker.

“Building owners want options, they don’t want to be stuck into a single system—and we think that’s an important thing to do,” he noted.

This trend of interoperability is a result of a larger shift within different utility solutions industries of abandoning traditional proprietary networks– and Autani is clearly leading the way.

“We think that open standards win… we think consumers want choice… and they want to be able to tie those [solutions] in an integrated way. They don’t want to have multiple platforms. We want to talk to multiple different platforms and bring those together,” Metker said. 

At Autani, adapting to modern building management needs has resulted in an effective, full service system that has applications throughout industries, even in healthcare. By using this technology in controlling lighting systems, this data can not only help with energy management, but through the use of data analytics, help genuinely improve many aspects of the patient experience.

“Right now we are doing lighting solutions and wayfinding but that’s not to say you couldn’t do a host of other data applications on that network,” Metker said.