Arm subsidiary Pelion, a connected IoT device service provider, is working with Johnson Controls on smart, healthy and sustainable buildings.

This partnership aims to accelerate innovation in connectivity, security and intelligence at the edge for Johnson Controls OpenBlue technology.

“This partnership combines Johnson Controls deep domain expertise in healthy buildings with Pelion’s device and edge management capabilities to usher in an era of truly smart, updateable facilities at cloud scale,” said Mike Ellis, chief customer and digital officer for Johnson Controls. “OpenBlue’s AI capabilities at the edge will consolidate diverse points of intelligence distributed across various floors, sites or even continents into insights and actions, creating an updateable building that can self-heal and evolve over its lifespan.”

This innovation mirrors the automotive sector, where software, multiple sensors and AI-trained models have transformed the industry by enabling autonomous driving and software updates that blend data to improve continually vehicle capabilities and experience. Johnson Controls is applying the concept to the built environment. It will leverage Pelion’s flexible device management capabilities to unite diverse device types and application layers to feed AI models that respond to dynamic workloads.

“Johnson Controls has the strategic foresight to rely on a partner to streamline the complexity of IoT device management security and secure firmware updates over the air,” said Hima Mukkamala, CEO of Pelion. “Pelion’s connected device platform will standardise the onboarding process for all systems, including the edge and endpoint devices that run on them, plus offer world-class public key infrastructure for secure and simple integration with third parties.”

This secure, open and flexible approach to device management will allow OpenBlue to run any device and hardware configuration, from hardware gateways to constrained temperature sensors.

To provide sustainable, low cost and low power intelligent processing at the edge, the partnership will use energy-efficient processors from Pelion’s parent company Arm. These are a key part of Johnson Controls’ distributed hardware deployment.