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Create momentum with gravity

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Gravity9 Supports Clients In Their Digital Journey

At gravity9, a combination of art and science brings a product together, taking clients like AMH closer towards their digital journey.

Noel Ady started gravity9 five years ago, with a view to bring together amazing people to create amazing things. “My background is as a software engineer, a solution architect and enterprise architect. I’ve been lucky to work as a consultant in many different cultures. “We have the full capability to put together a product” says Ady. “At gravity9, we have the ability to understand why a product should exist”.

gravity9.com gravity9 will often work with large organisations or enterprises that want to build a number of products to support their digital journey.

Digital journeys

“The individuals involved are not just skilled; the key is imagination and hard work. Those things combined help us generate that momentum with our clients.”

ESG is a key part of AMH’s strategy and technology is intrinsically intertwined with it.

“We are already in tune with all of the systems used to monitor that, and we're remediating issues,” says Irby. “We're at the top of our capability on the cybersecurity front. We're also working extensively to understand our energy usage through AI and analytics, gathering information from our communities or our portfolio homes.”

AMH has also built relationships with leading companies like Elevate, which help AMH to get better visibility into its energy consumption.

The way Irby sees it, technology drives sustainability, but AMH is using ESG to transform its technology. The company has established a sustainability group and its technology evolves in accordance with that.

“It's about AI and what we can leverage in terms of our energy usage, especially in HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning).”

Take this situation: there's a time when there's no one in the HMR home - somebody moves out and then somebody moves in, how are HMR going to make sure that the house is not overusing energy? Currently, somebody comes in during a showing and turns the thermostat down, then it might stay that way until somebody else comes in to change it. This is where automation, smart home technology and IoT come in.

75% of the traffic that AMH receives is from mobile devices, as users are out looking at houses in person different initiatives involving water usage and energy usage. Then, with cybersecurity being a part of ESG, we're at the forefront of that, too. In this industry, we won't compare ourselves to other businesses, but we're doing our best to meet the requirements of the cybersecurity components or questions, and initiatives within ESG.”

“We're working on a technology right now that will give us the ability to modify the interior HVAC thermostat during the turn,” explains Irby. “We've got a number of

75% of the traffic that AMH receives is from mobile devices, because prospective residents are looking at houses in person, away from their computers. AMH has an online platform that will allow renters to log on and take control of their home search.

“The platform is completely responsive,” explains Irby. “Everything we build is mobile-first, and it starts from the shopping experience, with people trying to locate a home or take a tour of one of our homes and then go through to leasing. All of this can be done from a mobile device in a simple way.”

Prospective buyers go through leasing and underwriting. They can interact with AMH property management and maintenance people as a resident.

“The purpose-built communities have amenity centres with pools, gyms and community hubs. Now, we can grant them access to all of those facilities without requiring them to check in with a property manager or get a fob - they can just use their phone.”

AI and automation

Close to 90% of US households have some form of air conditioning. AMH uses AI to keep track of them.

“As an example, if we are monitoring the usage of HVAC and also the behaviour of that HVAC, we can develop an algorithm that tells us when this HVAC unit is about to failimagine the difference this will make to the resident experience.”

For a family that lives in a hotter climate, if their HVAC fails it could be three days before it is fixed. But, if AMH knows that the unit is exhibiting a pattern of behaviour to suggest it’s failing, AMH can contact the residents ahead of time and arrange a servicing of the HVAC before it fails.

“That's a proactive use of technology to improve the experience for residents, so that they don't experience three days of unbearable heat, wondering when someone is going to show up and fix it so they can get on with their lives. Instead, we're showing up ahead of time.”

IRBY

At AMH, automation and streamlining can both improve the customer and employee experience.

Whether it's through automation and dynamic scheduling, or the different components that streamline and make AMH employees’ jobs easier, this comes through in their communication with residents.

“We make the job easier for our employees and happy employees make happy customers,” says Irby sincerely.

AMH goes through field services and dynamic scheduling, with their field technician going from one spot to the next. Even when new simple requests pop up, being able to service that resident dynamically changes the resident experience, and this also changes the employee's experience, because now it's a lot less about bureaucracy and ticking the box.

“It's all about improving the lives and experience of our customers,” says Irby.

Partnership with gravity9

gravity9 is an IT consulting company that unites art and science in building the consumer’s digital journey. Irby partnered with gravity9 seven years ago, when he worked at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas. gravity9 helped Irby transform the hotel’s identity and their rewards programme.

“I knew that they shared my vision for abstraction and domain-driven design and microservices,” says Irby. “I knew that AMH had an opportunity to build from the ground up, so I brought gravity9 over as well.”

Their shared vision, previous experience and longevity have made for a great partnership.

“The key to our partnership is, gravity9 has an exact understanding of our strategy and vision for the platform, and that comes through in the work that they do, and also in the work that my team does with them.

“I've worked with lots of vendors and there are people that will tell you what they want you to hear or what you want to hear - and people that will tell you the truth. Telling the truth in a partnership usually results in more respect and greater capability to work together. I think in the relationships that I've had that have been successful, that's one of the core foundations - being able to speak openly about differences or things that we need to be working towards.”

The next 12 months will be transformational at AMH. The company is adding a number of components to the platform, enhancing some that they already have and focusing on building the platform further. Irby is determined that that has got to be the focus.

“If you lose focus on trying to create that platform that is flexible, adaptable and capable of change, then you start to become a monolith. You move down the path towards brittle, unsustainable infrastructure and applications.”

Every 12 months holds that for AMH. Irby and his team will stay focused on the future and on flexibility.