The Client

Manufacturer of heating and air conditioning equipment for large, commercial buildings.

Background

The client is the largest HVAC solutions provider in the marketplace today. The company had achieved its success in its 50-year history through a primary emphasis on HVAC equipment, leaving the development of HVAC controls to others in the industry. The emergence of new technologies in recent years had opened new possibilities —such as system programability, networking and system-wide data analysis—in the HVAC control sector. As a result, control capabilities began to represent an increasingly larger portion of commodity value in the HVAC market sector. Since their reluctance to enter this market had caused them to gradually lag behind their competitors, the company embarked on the development new control technologies. The effort resulted in the development of a groundbreaking SaaS (software as a service) analytics solution. The solution would enable system-wide analytics and the networking of multiple HVAC hardware units from a single control interface.

The Project

Bessemer was hired to develop the necessary go-to-market models for the new SaaS solution. Bessemer analyzed the competitive landscape for the new control solution and worked with the client’s teams to craft and refine go-to-market approaches as well as multiple business model options for the new solution.

While under contract for business strategy services, Bessemer’s product design capabilities came into play. Bessemer partnered with the client to develop and refine the design and engineering aspects of the new SaaS technology. The proprietary solution is currently being developed for production.

Key Points: Strategic Alliances

While in the process of developing models of how to monetize the company’s software-as-a-service solution, Bessemer noted areas where the solution itself could be improved to better serve the intended function. This lead to Bessemer developing and proposing an entirely new control architecture that was then offered to the client. Noting that our company had an alliance with an adjacent service provider, Bessemer also helped cultivate a relationship between the two companies to develop a potential business agreement. A successful agreement between the two companies would make it more affordable and efficient to produce a groundbreaking, top-quality, highly marketable solution.