Aussie firm taps AWS to fix nation’s plumbing

Australian firm Urbanise is using AWS to ease the headache of organising plumbing repairs in buildings around the country.

Building services provider ARA Building Services has picked the Urbanise platform to automate orders for painters, renovators, construction crews and other services via a smartphone app.

The idea is to eliminate the need to make multiple phone calls for emergency repairs and other building work, said ARA Building Services managing director Tony Murr.

Tenants could order a plumber, organise the demolition of a kitchen or other ad-hoc work: “It’s anything from renovating and rebuilding to doing pest control spray.”

“It’s like a shop basically," Murr told CRN. “If you’re a resident and sitting in your lounge room and don’t like the look of a wall, and you say to yourself ‘I wish I could paint that wall tomorrow’, you [order using] the app."

Residents select the service they want, the app accepts a credit card payment, and an email is sent to a 24-hour call centre, which then dispatches an appropriate worker.

For emergency strata repairs like a roof leak, tenants might often call a strata company, which would then coordinate repairs.ARA’s aim is to handle this task for strata companies using Urbanise. 

The system is designed to be used by both landlords and tenants. In the case of non-strata work inside rental units requiring approval by a landlord, the system will dispatch a request for approval to the landlord before proceeding.

ARA already provides design, maintenance and construction services to strata companies around the country. The goal is to eventually have many of the strata companies that service millions of buildings – from commercial businesses to residential homes – using the system.

“The goal is to service the millions of apartments all around Australia. We have a true national footprint, and our intention is to organically grow a team to service Australia,” Murr said.

Telcos are another service provider channel earmarked by Urbanise.

Urbanise listed on the ASX in September 2014 and reported revenue of $3.3 million for the first half of the financial year ending 31 December 2014. The company reported a net loss of $52,744 during the same period.

Urbanise’s chief commercial officer is Rob Cumming, who was a founding member of Sausage Software, described as the first Internet company to list on the Australian Stock Exchange.