The Leeds Smart City Strategy: Innovation and Insights

In the words of my co-host Alex, ‘Hello and welcome to Aico TV!’. This week marks Episode 9, and I can certainly say that everyone involved has learnt a lot over the past nine weeks.

I have learnt that being in front of the camera isn’t as scary as I thought, and Alex has learnt that after a few takes, I will eventually get to the end of my sentence without laughing. But I think the person who has learnt the most is my colleague Matt, a fellow Marketing Executive! Matt has swapped social media for the studio and is responsible for making sure we have an episode ready for our viewers each week.

This week, I was guilty of getting the giggles, but I did eventually compose myself to tell you what’s coming on the episode. So, make sure you have a cup of tea, a couple of biscuits, a comfy seat, and let’s press play.

Before we begin, we have some very exciting news to share (so exciting that I completely forgot what to say!). Our Ei1000G SmartLINK Gateway has won the ‘Best Health and Safety Product’ category at this year’s Housebuilder Product Awards. For our newest product to achieve this recognition is astounding – everyone at Aico is delighted!

First, we look at the Leeds City Council ‘Smart Home Healthy Home’ Project with our National Sales Manager, Daniel Little, and CEO of HomeLINK, Luke Loveridge. They discuss how technology, such as environmental sensors and connected fire alarms, can help improve resident health and wellbeing and the quality of housing stock. Luke tells us more about HomeLINK’s recent project with Leeds City Council, the development of their resident app, and how the data can achieve sustainable behaviour change.

This is followed by Luke’s recent interview with Stephen Blackburn, Data and Innovation Manager at Leeds City Council; Stephen gives us an insight into the project from the Council’s perspective. One of my favourite things about Aico and HomeLINK is that innovation is at the forefront of everything we do, so it was great to hear about the positive impact this project is having on its participants.

For the next segment, we welcome back David Watts from Sparky Ninja for Part 3 of the mini-series. Behind the scenes, we did get slightly side-tracked, challenging each other to sneak ninja-related words into the intro – but as you can imagine, these bloopers didn’t quite make the final cut! This week, David, Andy and Carl talk about the importance of emergency lighting in communal areas and how it’s crucial for escape routes. We have loved the Sparky Ninja mini-series, and we look forward to seeing David (and his impressive selection of hats!) for the final instalment in next week’s episode.

Next up, our Relationships Manager, Tina Mistry, speaks to Nick Kilby, CEO, and Rob Chilton, Account Executive from Cratus Communications. The trio discusses how Aico and Cratus work together, the work that Cratus does within the housing sector, and the key agendas in social housing. There is plenty of thought-provoking discussion in this segment.

Sadly, it’s time for us to conclude this episode, but it’s not all bad – our lovely Technical Advisor, Indre, is here to answer this week’s FAQ. Indre explains the current standards and regulations applicable to domestic premises, existing properties and new builds – otherwise known as BS 5839-6:2019+A1:2020.

Thank you to everyone who has tuned in to the episode already! For those who need to catch up, it is available to watch here – and please remember to subscribe.

If you would like to submit a topic or feature on Aico TV, please contact marketing@aico.co.uk.

See you next week!

by Holly Moore

Holly is part of the Marketing team and enjoys walking up mountains and baking cakes.