SmartONE Solutions

Joined during early-stage growth and built the technology organization from the ground up — about 40 people by year three, about 80 by the end. The work spanned product strategy, software and cloud architecture, security, and the operating discipline that took a smart-community platform to national scale.

80 people at the close · 40 by year 3

30,000+ connected homes · tens of thousands of devices

40,000+ users on the platform

$100M+ contract revenue supported

2019 · Year 1

Building the organization

The first year was about foundations: joining an early-stage company and standing up the technology organization that would design, ship, and operate the platform. That meant architecture and engineering standards, development process, and a roadmap that could survive rapid growth.

The mandate covered the full path from product design through production release and ongoing operations — not a side of the house, the whole house.

2020 · Year 2

14 February 2020

Featured in the Toronto Star

In year two the platform was already in residents' hands. The Toronto Star published a feature on smart-community technology in Ontario buildings, using 10 York as an early example: in-suite wall pads, concierge communication, entrance cameras, security, and resident apps.

The Star photographed Farhad demonstrating the visitor-parking experience — one piece of a system that connected homes, shared building services, and the cloud behind them.

Farhad Keramati demonstrates the visitor-parking app. Photograph: Rick Madonik / Toronto Star. Read the feature

2021 · Year 3

A team of 40

Three years in, the organization had grown to about 40 people — software, QA, DevOps, product, and the wider company around them. The early-stage shop had become a working technology organization.

SmartONE team gathered in the office around a holiday poinsettia, about 40 people. — SmartONE after three years — a team of about 40.

2019 — 2025

The work across the years

The same thread ran through the later years: grow the team, harden the platform, and keep the product useful as the company scaled. By the end the organization was about 80 people.

Directed a multidisciplinary technology organization from design through production and operations, growing from the founding team to about 80 people.
Defined software architecture, engineering standards, development processes, and the technology roadmap through rapid company growth.
Established discipline across product strategy, architecture, security, QA, release management, and production support.
The platform runs 40,000+ users, 30,000+ connected homes, and tens of thousands of connected devices across multiple properties.
Built AI workflows on millions of IoT and behavioral-event data points — community insights and analytics, and an AI interface residents and property managers used to ask questions and carry out actions.
Formed hardware and technology vendor partnerships across multiple countries to extend the smart-community offering.

Bell Canada and KD Navien

The chapter closed when Bell Canada took over the company. The business was sold to KD Navien of Korea.