Who are we?

Sidewalk Labs is an Alphabet company with a mission to radically improve urban life. We aim to create inclusive, large-scale communities by bringing together an innovative planning approach, products and services designed to address urban challenges, and capital for real estate and advanced infrastructure. 

Since our founding in 2015, we've grown into an organization of over 100 employees based primarily in New York and Toronto. Our cross-disciplinary team consists of experts from real estate, urban planning, government, finance, technology, and engineering, among other backgrounds.

To date, we've incubated and invested in multiple companies focused on solving city problems, and we've launched the Sidewalk Toronto project, which aims to create a community along Toronto's waterfront that achieves new standards of sustainability, affordability, and economic opportunity for all. 

As we move forward, Sidewalk Labs has begun to execute on a broad strategy to pioneer innovative placemaking by providing an integrated suite of services, systems, products, and capital to property owners, developers, and municipalities that seek to combine forward-thinking urban design and cutting-edge technology to make cities and projects radically more inclusive and sustainable, in ways that also enable Sidewalk to achieve commercial success.

With the potential to catalyze and scale new models for inclusive growth, our work is both highly exciting and complex. We are working to achieve something unprecedented.

What is the role?

One of our most promising efforts focuses on the opportunities of bringing 21st century technology to bear on how we manage buildings. We have a vision for data- and computer-enabled building operation with a high degree of automation even within tenant space. Our initial focus is electricity demand management to support our goal of “affordable electrification” in which we will serve the needs of a fully electrified neighborhood (including mobility and all heating needs) within the capacity of a typical power grid.

We are looking for a building controls expert to lead our building automation workstream and support the integration of building with infrastructure controls. Because we are prototyping our own building typology (Factory), we have an opportunity to integrate controls into all building systems and achieve unprecedented levels of automation. Initially, this is where your focus will be. Alongside, you will be exploring broader business potential for automation software. Further, you will be responsible for piloting your ideas that will be deployed in the first building pilot a year from now.

This role sits within our Urban Systems’ division as a member of the Sustainability team, while working closely with the Digital Architecture team’s Principal Engineer. 

What are the deliverables?After 3 months, you will have….

• Contributed to the detailed design of Sidewalk Labs’ Factory Kit of Parts for control sensor selection, placement and communications, utilizing IoT and a novel “open standards” BMS.
• Worked with our Principal Engineer to draft Open Data Standards and security and API requirements for mechanical system manufacturers to establish comprehensive building system integration across lighting, plug loads and HVAC.
• Laid out a project plan for developing and testing building automation controls sequences for Sidewalk Labs Factory buildings, including data management, protocols and advanced control logic / machine learning.
• Taken over management of three ongoing building pilots to test sensors, receive and study building systems and human comfort data, and test new control sequences.
• Initiated or strengthened key controls industry partnerships with an eye to business arrangements and relationships.

After 6 months, you will have….

• Presented several go-to-market strategies for Building Automation, including sizing the market, and charting the partnerships and investment capital required for commercialization in two to four years.
• Shortlisted software development, servicing and sales channel partners. In contracting with sensor and controls companies with IP protections and future licensing potential.
• Working closely with the AD-Mechanical and power grid consultants, developed a strategy for integrating thermal energy generation and storage into a neighborhood Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS).

What We Expect

At Sidewalk Labs, our Associate Directors typically couple broad, deep and relevant experience with a multidisciplinary background that helps them adapt to an entrepreneurial, strategically-focused and forward-thinking company culture.

Below are some of the key things we care about for this role:

• Deep knowledge about a wide range of existing control systems and programs, their limitations and the cause of those limitations, and the new technologies or ideas that could overcome these limitations to disrupt and radically improve outcomes.
• Experience in the use of controls to manage building and/or district thermal energy systems, which includes understanding how building systems (e.g. HVAC, plumbing, electrical, security, access, lighting, networking, and work ticket management) work and the data streams that are available and useful.
• Orientation to results and execution; excited to see ideas implemented and tested in the real world and skilled and motivated to roll up their sleeves and put on their boots to get things done expeditiously.

The community of the future is a place for everyone, and Sidewalk Labs is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We encourage individuals from underrepresented groups to apply. All employment is based on merit and business needs.