Talking Heads

TALKING HEADS Dan Shields

Dan Shields is CEO of Shields Energy

Making waves in the FM market

industry has been incentivised to go to site rather than remedy the situation. We hope we are putting power back in the hands of the customers. We are interrupting the FM market.” Corporate social governance Shields firmly believes that environmental corporate social governance will come to the fore in the coming years. “We are starting to see it kick in now, “ he stated. “Institutional investors aren’t backing the ugly ‘vice stocks.’ It’s a really exciting time as people are becoming aware of climate change.”

Shields is hoping the business can follow the same path as his two previous businesses and expand beyond the UK. “They have started in the UK and gone to Western Europe and North America and become small global businesses. However, I don’t think there is such a need to go to Europe yet as there is so much opportunity here. Many organisations have been focused on economic growth and not had a chance to look at whether their operations are as efficient as they could be. There are companies who have undertaken initiatives but what has happened is that there has been little quantification of the results. So by bringing a very granular examination of savings we can reassure the customer.”

This process can be helped by better use of the smart meter deployment. “Although legislation demanded a roll out, connectivity was not," he added. “We went to one site at a railway station where they had 56 meters and they weren’t connected to anything. A lot of organisations are missing a trick. "Also, over the next ten years manufacturers will build in more intelligence to devices but customers aren’t going to want to log on to many different platforms. So it’s essential that data is centralised and easily shared.”

Whatever the future holds Shields is adamant that the philosophy of the company will not alter. It will continue to be driven by what the customer wants – and stir up the FM market on the way.  I t was pretty difficult interviewing Dan Shields. Not because he had nothing interesting to say but because of the surroundings. The CEO of Shields Energy has created a stunning office from a derelict pontoon that juts out into the Thames Estuary in Essex. By the time the interview had finished the tide had come in surrounding the office on three sides.

The office is typical of Shields’ entrepreneurial spirit. “This is our third technology business,” he said. “The two previous businesses were centred on the asset management of retired telecoms equipment and the substances in them. The first business concentrated on wiping the phones and setting up recycling programmes. The refurbished phones were then sent overseas. Our second business focused on the telecoms infrastructure found at the bottom of masts that companies didn’t want to send to landfill.”

Having built up and sold these businesses, Shields looked around and realised that “energy is the No. 1 challenge facing humanity over the next 50 years.” Shields Energy was born out of selling a portfolio of other companies’ products including voltage optimisation and boiler controls. “I just thought that they weren’t too exciting so we went out to our customers to find out the challenges they were facing,” Shields added. “We started out with the train operators and created a lighting controller. They also had the problem of copper earths being stolen and only being discovered when an inspection was made.” Creating modular IoT solution Shields Energy’s answer was to create a modular IoT solution. CODA is a nextgeneration building management system that offers a fully integrated building solution with a data analytics platform for industrial and commercial building and estate digitalisation. The company says it will deliver reduced utility costs, provide granular data, building health diagnostics, asset condition monitoring and safety improvements. “Everything we have done has been customer led,” commented Shields. “We haven’t made a black box and then said ‘would you like to buy this.’ ”

By using the company's system train operators have been able to reduce sites visits. “In many instance it has gone from 10 to none per month,” added Shields. “So the benefit lies not only in the immediate carbon reduction but the downstream carbon reduction. What we started to see was a return on investment thanks not only to the energy savings but also a quicker return thanks to maintenance and safety savings. In bus depots, for example, we can monitor carbon monoxide levels. What we learnt is that the benefits of IoT go way beyond energy savings. "End users are more demanding as they are not just looking for energy savings but the savings in ‘truck roll’ far outweigh energy saved. Reduced telecoms costs enable you to get a realtime view of the efficiency of your estate from an iPad.”

A further advantage of CODA is the wide range of sites where it can be used. “Most systems are focused on single sites,” stated Shields. “We are aimed at small to medium sites as well as large estates. But we don’t want to be just a control system. We also want to centralise the intelligence for the ease of use of our customers. The information has to be presented in such a way that you don’t need a degree in mechanical engineering. In that way the finance director can get some of the benefits. The FM Dan Shields has successfully made waves in the telecoms industry. Now he’s hoping that his technology can shake up the facilities management market, as he explained to EiBI’s Mark Thrower Shields: 'end users are more demanding as they are looking for more than energy savings' ‘We are aimed at small to medium sites as well as large estates’

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