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Welcome to the Distilled Buildings Tech Podcast: Shaken, Stirred, and Data-Driven
31 Plays16 days ago
🔥 Episode Summary
In this inaugural episode, hosts Jason Shearer and Akram “AK” Khalis introduce themselves, share their journeys into smart building technology, and lay out the vision for the Distilled Buildings Tech Podcast.
From humble beginnings in engineering, real estate, and IT, to pioneering innovations in Power over Ethernet (PoE) lighting and infrastructure, Jason and AK discuss how their diverse backgrounds converge to make buildings smarter, more efficient, and truly connected.
They also reveal the podcast’s origin story (hint: bourbon-fueled conversations at Cisco Live Amsterdam 🍸), the structure for future episodes, and their mission to demystify smart buildings with insights from industry experts — and a good drink in hand.
🛠️ Topics Covered
- Jason and AK’s career paths into smart buildings and digital infrastructure
- How early experiences in real estate and engineering shaped their perspectives
- The evolution from incandescent lighting to LEDs and PoE systems
- How LED efficiency unlocked the future of building electrification
- The real meaning behind “smart buildings” vs. “smart systems”
- Why converging building systems onto a single network backbone matters
- The founding story of the Distilled Buildings Tech Podcast
- What listeners can expect each episode: Bourbon, Building Tech, and Big Ideas
🥃 This Episode’s Drinks
- AK: Basil Hayden Bourbon
- Jason: Leiper’s Fork Bourbon (Bottled in Bond) — dangerously smooth at 110 proof!
📅 Release Schedule
New episodes drop every other Monday — perfect for kicking off your week with a dose of bourbon and building innovation.
🎧 Who Should Listen?
- Building owners and developers
- Facility managers and real estate professionals
- Technologists and infrastructure teams
- Product manufacturers
- Bourbon enthusiasts with a passion for smarter spaces
📣 How to Support the Show
- Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or YouTube
- Leave a review and share your thoughts
- Connect with Jason and AK on LinkedIn
- DM us questions or guest suggestions — we’re building this community together!
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast and Hosts
00:00:20
Speaker
All right, welcome to the Distilled Buildings Tech Podcast. Where smart buildings are shaken, stirred, and data-driven. I am your host, Jason Shear. i'm your host, AK Akram Kalis.
00:00:33
Speaker
And this is our first episode, so we're going to kick off a little bit with just telling you a bit about ourselves. So Akram, like tell me tell me how you got into you know the smart buildings industry or maybe like what your you know your career arc was that that got you where you are today.
00:00:49
Speaker
Sure, yeah. I started as an engineer. I was ah little kid that opened up every single toy and never put it back together. And that's how my parents figured out that I really should be an engineer. That drove them to put me into a specific college, a specific school system that allows me to take multiple degrees into one person and i was able to build product mechanically, put software, put hardware on and build an actual product that I can take to market.
00:01:15
Speaker
I did it a few times and here we are at MHT. I run the company. We're smart building technology and a company that does power of Ethernet lighting. Jason, how about you?
Career Journeys into Smart Building Technology
00:01:26
Speaker
Awesome.
00:01:26
Speaker
Yeah, so i've I've been in the tech industry for 25 years. I've been at Cisco Systems for 15 in a variety of roles, from collaboration to industrial partnerships, and now ah leading a team around ah smart building, go-to-market as our workplace's CTO.
00:01:47
Speaker
ah But I'd say like my my building's journey like started a long, long time ago, like before I even got into the to the tech industry. um My family, my dad my stepdad was a ah real estate developer and broker.
00:02:04
Speaker
um So even before i went to before I got out of high school, before I went to college, I had my real estate license in Kansas City and did a lot of a lot of like transaction brokerages for, ah for, for commercial properties.
00:02:20
Speaker
I never, ever, ever thought that that experience like way back when would, you know, would really have any impact on what I do today for a living. That's cool. That's awesome. um so you've, you've told me before, like you, you know, you're, you're not, you're originally from Morocco.
00:02:39
Speaker
Like how did you, how'd end up in the, in the U S and, you know, starting all these businesses? Yeah, so through middle school, we i joined the program by Alcatel at the time that allowed us through a high school, as a high school student, I would study engineering. And the entire high school program was not only your study in your entire high school, but you actually learn and become and a true engineer. So labs, I went through mechanical engineering, hardware, engineering, engineering.
00:03:08
Speaker
And that basically led me into becoming a true engineer product development. And sure, after high school, instead of going to France, my parents decided to bring me to the U.S. And that's how started my journey.
00:03:21
Speaker
Came to the U.S., found myself with a little bit of knowledge on how to build products. And I found myself with little entrepreneurial spirits. And I took that, collaborated together together.
00:03:33
Speaker
that's what creates products into businesses, into um shifting that over and over and creating product, getting them to customers, getting them to users and then ah doing it and again and again.
00:03:43
Speaker
Yeah. Awesome. and And I guess like like lu catel all ah um Lucent Alcatel, like being a French company, that was like sort of like the connection to like to to Morocco. Yeah, that was that was it. Being in from Morocco and specifically Casablanca, you get to be speaking both languages, Spanish and French, or at least you get some influence of both.
00:04:04
Speaker
And because of that, that was the driving motivation for a lot of the students that were, we were 30 students out of 30 million or 36 million students in the country that wanted that program. And that allows you basically to stay motivated, stay concentrated and they pick, they try to pick the best. And that's what, that was the driving motivation for them. And it worked out great for all of us.
00:04:25
Speaker
Yeah. Awesome. I grew up in, um, I grew up in Kansas city, so I've, I've moved around a little bit in my, you know, my and my ah career in career and adulthood, um, went to Kansas state university for mechanical engineering.
00:04:38
Speaker
And then like a lot of, like a lot of engineers never actually like practiced, practiced at me. Yeah. Um, I had, you know, some internships at Allied Signal and Honeywell.
00:04:50
Speaker
um And although, like, engineering, like, for a lot of us, it teaches us, like, critical thinking skills and like troubleshooting and problem solving, um you know, systems integration and almost like immediately went into the the technology industry at a school.
00:05:08
Speaker
That's awesome. When did you make the shift to IT t and infrastructure? Yeah. like Like I said, straight out of um straight out of, ah you know, the university went into my first IT job as like,
00:05:22
Speaker
a lowly like help desk technician, you know, like everybody, everybody in IT starts, you know, starts at the bottom and then work my way up into, you know, networking, infrastructure, and video communication. So I work for a company that,
00:05:37
Speaker
It jumped right in with IP telephony like right around 2000, just after Cisco Systems bought a ah tiny little company called Celsius.
00:05:49
Speaker
um And you know we were putting voice over IP phones on desks. And no one thought, like at that time, like everybody thought that it's never going to work. Right? like voice Ethernet's not reliable enough you know for for voice traffic.
00:06:03
Speaker
And there were some there are some there are some hard times like in the early voice over IP days. but It's funny, like looking back now, um and when we were at Panduit last week, ah you know, asking all these, you know, cabling contractors and telecom, you know, consultants, like, raise your hand if you, you know, if you've installed a PBX in a room lately and, you know, use like, you know, 66 blocks and one ten s and everybody's like, no, it doesn't work that way anymore. yeah Yeah. It's like asking our children about a floppy disks. Yeah.
00:06:37
Speaker
yeah Go get the VHS tape. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah, so that was, that was kind of my journey, work for, you know, resellers and partners for like the first seven or eight years of my career. And then.
00:06:51
Speaker
I'd say like my other, like my second little dip into, you know, into buildings and, you know, integrated systems was um i was working for a partner that was consulting for a healthcare company.
00:07:05
Speaker
And that healthcare company was building a brand new corporate headquarters. So somewhere around like 160,000 feet data center footprint, at least at the time, it's like a 20,000 square foot data center. ah at least at the time it's like a twenty thousand square foot data center And I weaseled my way into construction trailers and design meetings, you know, with MEP firms and architects. And they're like, why is this telecom guy here?
00:07:31
Speaker
um But it was really, really important because we integrated, you know, all the structure cabling, like all the infrastructure, you know, in day one. So everything that we know as, at least in the U.S., is DIV 27.
00:07:43
Speaker
Like it was, it was, you know, part of the plan rather than just, just an afterthought. Fascinating. That's awesome.
Innovations in Smart Building Lighting
00:07:51
Speaker
And I saw the same trend with LEDs, you know, coming from MHT. MHT was originally called MHT Lighting.
00:07:59
Speaker
And that was the company that did, we did induction lighting for ah hot 20 minutes. And then, of course, LEDs came to market. And yeah, it's it was the same journey seeing customers that are looking ahead and wanted that reduction in KW and reduction in Watts and they were put in LEDs, but then of course it has its challenges in the beginning, and just like every other technology was still being perfected. We still get LED burnouts. They were not ready for outdoor.
00:08:25
Speaker
And look at us now, you can, you cannot go anywhere and put an incandescent bulb. You have to put an LED. And that's the journey we're in. It's, we're going to be data driven. We get, we were hungry for information. We want dividing the way on controls and we've been building buildings forever.
00:08:41
Speaker
without that technology in mind. And I think that's going to change. when you When you guys, so you said you dipped your toes and you know in incandescence for for a hot minute. like was that Was that transition to LEDs, was it like really obvious to you? Or what was the like what was the indicator?
00:09:00
Speaker
Yeah, the mission of MHT has always been an energy conser conservation optimization to the end user, regardless of what the technology was. And having incandescent lighting was a commodity at the time, but having LEDs was just a future proof in your your space. You don't put a 100-watt light bulb and you know it's going to draw 100 watts. The equivalent LEDs were 7 watts. So magically, you did 93% savings and you achieved the same outcome.
00:09:29
Speaker
It was a no-brainer to every end user to put in LED lights. And then the journey continued from just going to LEDs and and then the market the American market or North American market was saturated ah by the Far East. And of course, we went to controls. Even though you had LEDs, you don't want to keep them on twenty four seven especially in commercial buildings and healthcare care and hospitalities and education. So you wanted that automated controls. That's where we shifted to Inspector. and that's and how Inspector was born, is ability to create more same mission, optimize energy in the building.
00:10:02
Speaker
You wanted that autonomous control. And you could do it VIP, where you can deliver power and data over the same cable. That was it. What was that? So, so obviously like LEDs, like that was the first entrance control systems. And then for you, what was the aha of POE, you know, being the, like the delivery mechanism, like where, it where did that, like that, like spark of innovation originally come from?
00:10:28
Speaker
No sparks in PoE for sure. Touch safe, lick safe. yeah yeah Totally. And it was it was actually a a company that did low voltage energy transmission using category cable.
00:10:40
Speaker
And for them, it was a proprietary system that delivered power and data, but it was over category cable. And that was the messaging is customers understood that the same ethernet cable that they plug their printer on, it's the same one that they can power light with.
00:10:55
Speaker
And then HTLightIn at the time was the largest reseller for them. And we were able to deploy large number of projects to Fortune 500. And that created a market ah for us. And of course, slightly after about a year or two from being at the you know at the hype and at the top,
00:11:12
Speaker
We found ourselves with a technology, but then the the control package was bought by a different company and shelved. And we had customers asking us for the same exact technology. And that's when I started my journey with Power of Ethernet, with 15 watts to 30 watts to 60, and we keep upgrading to 90 and beyond now.
00:11:32
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, that was kind of like the wild ride of you know coming into the industry around the year 2000, voice over IP. And at that time, non-standard PoE, like when, as, as Cisco had created with 7.5 Watts and like the first IEEE ratification was 15 Watts.
00:11:50
Speaker
And at the time, like that seemed like a lot, but in early 2000, in the early 2000s, like before, cause like what year was like the massive shift to led? Like that had to be like,
00:12:04
Speaker
2010. Yeah, 2010, 2011. The company was formed in 2009. Like I said, 20 minutes later, we found literally 12 months, we found o ourselves not doing incandescence anymore. yeah And that was 2010, 2011.
00:12:17
Speaker
We were doing mostly LEDs, assembly, made in America, shipped and shipped from here to either South America or North America. and But LEDs were really a like an enabling technology for the advent of POE lighting because pre-LED, you couldn't even power a single incandescent light on a 15-watt port.
00:12:38
Speaker
Yep. Yeah. Exactly. it it was that And still the momentum is growing because you can see that LED efficiency went down. went high in in efficiency, but down in lumen per watt.
00:12:51
Speaker
And that's that's really created a ah bigger market for us to deliver more bo outcome with the same single cable. So you can now, with 90 watts, you can imagine how much light output you can actually deliver.
00:13:02
Speaker
ye Yeah, which we all know that 90 watts 100 watts in class two is kind of like the end of the road um for for PoE. But i think I think in future episodes, we'll get into, you know, how do we you know how do we get ah intelligent power beyond ah the class two barrier?
Podcast Origin and Focus
00:13:21
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:21
Speaker
Why don't we tell the audience how does ah how did this podcast get exist? Yeah. Yeah, so and and we've only, I mean, honestly, like we've only known each other for about a year or so. um i've i've been in I've been in this role at Cisco for just going on two years, i leading yeah the engineering side of our of our you know smart work smart and intelligent workspaces, go-to-market.
00:13:44
Speaker
um and that And that really came from... my collaboration background, like a little bit of, you know, a little bit of, you know, digital building background. And just, I think it set me up pretty well, but where we came together, um obviously was in, you know, PUE and how that's like an enabler for digital buildings. But the podcast idea, um think we were, I think it was in Amsterdam. We were at the vault bar. Yeah. It says Cisco live in Amsterdam, back in ah January, February, March, like a March, March timeframe.
00:14:18
Speaker
and you drug me and a couple of other people down to the the vault bar, which is this like, um what what do they call It's kind of like um you ordered your drinks by vibe. yeah Like you didn't order off the menu, like that if you don't order an old fashion or a whiskey, you tell them like, how are you feeling tonight? And then they go like make a cocktail, like based on that. 25 minutes later you get a cocktail, but yes, it was absolutely an experience for sure. Yeah, I think we were sitting around that night and, and you know, we we kind of just like came up with the idea of, hey, like we both like we both like bourbon and um and, you know, mixed drinks like old fashioned. And we like talking about technology. So let's ah let's let's start a podcast and ah kind of educate the world a little bit.
00:15:05
Speaker
Yeah, we see that, you know, spreading awareness and education has been biggest. the the first thing that we want to do and promote is get get in front of people to to explain and let experts come in and actually educate the market about how you can actually get into a smart building. I mean, the the definition of smart building, you ask 100 people, you get 100 different answers.
00:15:25
Speaker
We're going to try to unify that and bring experts, bring building owners, bring building facility managers, anyone that's interested and get them educated and provide them enough information so at least we can get to a common ground.
00:15:39
Speaker
yeah I think like one, one thing we see all the time is like you said, everybody says that they have smart buildings, but a lot of times you'll see that they have smart systems within their buildings.
00:15:51
Speaker
um So they might have like really smart, like HVAC scheduling, but the HVAC scheduling has no idea about like occupancy from the building. um But what we, what we've identified is there's a lot of,
00:16:06
Speaker
you know, almost almost like bullheadedness or institutional knowledge around this is how I've always done it. I'm not going to change the way I'm doing it because it's goingnna it's going to, you know, it's going to be disruptive.
00:16:17
Speaker
It might be risky and, you know, and change the, um you know, the risk profile for whatever project I'm working on. um But what we found is and a lot of cases, you can actually mitigate risk by bringing everything onto a common fabric, right? so And having, whether it's whether it's base building systems or lighting or, you know, conferencing systems, like all on the same, you know, ip network backbone, it can actually remove risk and even shrink projects, you know, project timelines.
00:16:51
Speaker
Yeah. And we see it the complexity just gets drastically better because there's no more products and and complex systems and proprietary systems that you have to stitch together to get to the goal that you mentioned, which is smart building.
00:17:04
Speaker
Yeah. Um, so we're going have, you know, we're going to, we're talk about that and how to overcome some of those barriers. Uh, every episode we will have some sort of a guest on. So that could be somebody from, you know, a building owner, another technology company,
00:17:19
Speaker
um you know, consultants, contractors, like you name it, we're going to have a very, very wide variety of um ah of ah experts on the show um every episode.
00:17:31
Speaker
Including Bourbon experts and sommeliers. we totally we did We totally didn't. So like about, so like what's what's in the name, a k like Distilled ah Buildings Tech Podcast, like what's what's that what's that all about?
00:17:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's the combination of distilled spirits and and bourbons and mixed drinks and cheers. Cheers. yeah and That's going to be the the start in every single episode. We'll have at least the mixology or notes or at least ah we'll open up a bourbon or ah drinks and talk about it.
00:18:03
Speaker
ah So we give the audience a little bit of knowledge there. And we'll talk about where that background comes from. And I think the the following 10 minutes, will'll give we'll give a top of mind and talk about the the world's news. And I think the the last 20 minutes is when we bring on the guest and talk about an actual topic that's in the text ways.
00:18:21
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. um and it'll be and And the episodes will be either fortnightly, so every every other week. um I know it's a lot of times like biweekly can get a little bit confusing, but and every Monday...
00:18:37
Speaker
ah Every other Monday is when we'll drop new episodes. Yep. So you'll be able to kick off your week with, ah you know, with either a bourbon on Monday night, like after, after getting the Monday grind done um or listen to it on the way to work and wish you were having a bourbon with us.
00:18:53
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cool.
Audience and Engagement
00:18:57
Speaker
Who, um so we talked about a little bit about who, We're going to bring on like from a, know, from a guest standpoint, you know industry, industry experts, um you know, building owners, manufacturers, solution providers who should listen to this podcast and to, you know, to absorb some of that information.
00:19:16
Speaker
This podcast is is for building owners, technologists, infrastructure team, product manufacturer, and bourbon enthusiast. Anyone that wants to learn about spirits or is building a building and really wants to understand how to do it um from the ground up.
00:19:32
Speaker
Yeah. Awesome. Well, um I'm excited to get this going with you. We already have a pretty, ah I'd say, I'd say a pretty star studded cast of, um of episodes in the, in the books or, or being recorded in the next couple of weeks.
00:19:48
Speaker
Anything, anything else you want to leave with the the audience before we roll? Oh, we we we didn't even talk about we're drinking. but What's in your, what's in your glass today? i I cracked the basil hayden.
00:20:00
Speaker
Nice. Yeah. What about you? That's a good standard. So I'm i'm drinking a Leaper's Fork ah bourbon um from um from Franklin, Tennessee.
00:20:12
Speaker
A good friend of mine, stue Stu Patrick, gave it to me a couple of weeks ago. it is It's bottled in Bond. um So it is uh, a hundred, 110 proof, but, uh, uh, and it's aged for four years, but I'm telling you like this bourbon, it drinks like super smooth, like for 110 proof bourbon is not, it's not hot on the palate whatsoever. Awesome. here it's ah It's one of those dangerous bourbons. Dangerously smooth.
00:20:42
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Cheers to that. Cheers. Yeah.
00:20:46
Speaker
Cool. So um obviously, first episode in the in the in the books, ah you know everybody subscribe to to the show on like whatever your favorite podcast app is, you know whether it's Apple Podcasts, Spotify.
00:21:01
Speaker
I'm a big fan of of Overcast myself. It'll be published on on YouTube and Apple Podcasts. We'll be posting clips to to social media on LinkedIn and YouTube Shorts and and all ah all of that good stuff. And and definitely...
00:21:18
Speaker
share it with your friends. And if you're not connected with us on, you know, on LinkedIn or social media, ah definitely, definitely do that. Yeah. Leave us review. Tell us comments.
00:21:29
Speaker
we're We're here to listen. We're here to obviously get answers for you. Even if you have some questions, drop us DMs, give us comments, reviews. Yeah. Awesome.
00:21:39
Speaker
So we'll see you guys in two weeks and until next time, stay curious and stay distilled.