Energy efficient and sustainable building planning

Project Information

SEMERGY

Grant agreement ID: 697111

DOI

10.3030/697111

Project closed

EC signature date 17 August 2015

Start date 1 August 2015

End date 31 October 2015

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Secure, clean and efficient energy

Total cost

€ 71 429,00

EU contribution

€ 50 000,00

Coordinated by

XYLEM SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT GMBH
Austria

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SEMERGY (Energy efficient and sustainable building planning)

Reporting period: 2015-08-01 to 2015-10-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Buildings are responsible for 40% of the energy consumption and 36% of greenhouse emissions in the EU. Reduction of building’s environmental impact is key to achieving 2020 climate goals. Regulatory measures and economical drivers (ROI through energy savings) are driving spectacular growth of the Energy Efficient Building (EEB) product and services sectors. For EEB companies, the path to reach customers and make sales is long and costly. Lack of awareness, the need to educate the customer and the development of differentiation strategies are the main challenges for all stakeholders.
Building owners, when considering alternatives in a design or retrofit project, are challenged by high investment costs, uncertainty about savings and the complex nature of the domain. These are the main barriers preventing a wider adoption of building refurbishing projects.
Our aim is to provide a platform for early involvement of all relevant value chain stakeholders through an innovative solution. Semergy will provide the following advantages for owners, professionals and companies:
 Building owners will be able to assess technologies available for their specific need with our Decision Support System.
 Moreover, for these professionals, our Optimization Environment will enhance efficacy in the design process.
 As a result, for EEB product and services providers, Semergy will provide a unique Online Marketing Tool.
At Xylem Technologies we are experts in semantic web technologies. Our core competences are the development of new methodologies aimed towards practical application in the fields of sustainability and risk management. The strategic growth line of our company is the development and commercial dissemination of novel software tools aimed to reduce CO2 emissions. Semergy is the continuation of these efforts with the clear technological and commercial objective to penetrate the European Energy Efficient Building (EEB) market and foster its growth.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

We conducted a feasibility study with the objective of gaining further insight in the technical details and commercial tasks required to introduce the solution in the international market.
From a technical point of view, we have established a detailed plan to realize all the product development activities. We made great progress in definition of the online marketing tools that will be incorporated in the upgraded version of Semergy and user interface (3D modelling). We searched a suitable subcontractor which will bring their expertise in fine tuning our product strategy. We provision the inclusion of a marketing specialist to our team to ensure market adaptation over the years of commercialization. Extensive research was conducted to select target markets, for which technical adaptation of the calculation engines and database extensions will be performed. We have changed our initial assumptions and decided to start the adaptation of Semergy with Germany, United Kingdom, France, Italy and Sweden. We conclude that the software development will be conducted by our current team supported by consultants who will provide the specific market requirements. We have started selection of these consultants. We have designed the conditions necessary to conduct the test of the upgraded version of Semergy and engaged with the product manufacturer Baumit to participate in it. A deep intellectual property analysis found that no conflict exists to protect the results of the Semergy project.
From a commercial point of view, we have evaluated the potential market and concluded that it is foreseeable that the market will continue to grow. Conducted a thorough research on customer acquisition costs of our end users, and defined our product and pricing strategy accordingly to provide a more cost effective service. We have segmented the market to define those with higher potential for Semergy and identified number of potential clients in each of these segments: ESCOs, PV system integrators and Insulation manufacturers with a portfolio of sustainable products. We are focusing our efforts to find distributors to those with reach to these target segments. We laid out our user acquisition plan based on targeted actions to those geographical areas with higher interest (i.e. favorable regulatory framework and financial incentives).
From a financial point of view, we evaluated the investment necessary to complete the technical and commercial task for the commercialization of Semergy.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Buildings are responsible for 40% of the energy consumption and 36% of greenhouse emissions in the EU. 80% of the buildings we will occupy in 2050 are standing today, with adequate measures, they have the potential to reach 70% reduction in their green house effect gas emissions and energy savings worth €270 billion per year. As a result of the Semergy project, we aim to roll out a platform in EU member states which will enhance the interaction of all relevant stakeholders in the value chain. It will contribute to lowering the entry barriers to sustainable products and increase the renovation rate of buildings.

The development of the Semergy solution will foster the market penetration of our company into European markets and support market growth in our current market (Austria). Based on the commercialization and exploitation strategy prepared with this feasibility study, we have envisioned a progressive penetration in the market over the first five years. Our conservative projections show cumulative gross profit in five years from initial commercialization of €15.8 Million.

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