Johnson Controls, the global leader for smart, healthy and sustainable buildings, today announced the official opening of its new, state-of-the-art, OpenBlue Innovation Centre for engineering and excellence in Hyderabad.

The Johnson Controls, OpenBlue Innovation Centre in Hyderabad was inaugurated by K. T. Rama Rao, Minister for Municipal Administration & Urban Development, Industries & Commerce, and Information Technology, Telangana. Attendance included Dave Pulling, Vice President & General Manager, Global Security Products, Johnson Controls, Gopal Paripally, Global VP, Engineering & Technology, Johnson Controls, and Tazmin Pirani, Vice President, Global Engineering for Intrusion products, Johnson Controls.

“The establishment of the Johnson Controls OpenBlue Innovation Centre in Hyderabad, is significant for fostering critical innovation in sustainable technology for building security, and for the state’s efforts towards establishing itself as a hub for tech-innovation and talent in India”, said Minister K.T. Rama Rao. “We are proud of our collaboration with Johnson Controls and our role in facilitating the setting up of this centre.”

This centre, spread across 41,000 sq. ft. at the prestigious Gowra Fountainhead, HITEC city in Hyderabad, joins the existing network of OpenBlue Innovation Centres in India and further expands Johnson Controls presence in India. The current network already includes Innovation Centres in Pune, Gurgaon, Bangalore and Delhi, India. This OpenBlue Innovation Centre focuses on research and development for security products and is dedicated to transforming customer experiences using intelligent edge devices.

“By deploying new fifth wave technology advances in the form of IoT, AI and 5G, buildings will be reimagined to deliver on decarbonization, sustainability, energy efficiency and renewable energy goals while optimizing performance,” said Vijay Sankaran, Johnson Controls chief technology officer. This new centre is aligned with our innovation in building technology and the strong network of Johnson Controls OpenBlue Innovation Centres across the globe.”

Johnson Controls is partnering with Accenture on this new OpenBlue Innovation Centre in Hyderabad. Accenture will play a prominent role in the project by providing a software engineering team to directly support Johnson Controls efforts to incorporate leading-edge technology including 5G, Internet of Things (IoT), Metaverse platforms and digital twins. These technologies will work in concert with Johnson Controls OpenBlue platform — the company’s AI-enabled building management system. OpenBlue is a cloud-based suite of connected solutions and services that integrates with its customers’ existing IT and operational technology.

The team of architects, scientists, and engineers will use cutting-edge OpenBlue technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, biometrics and more to build market-leading security products including those in both the intrusion and access control and video surveillance (ACVS) product lines.

The OpenBlue Innovation Centre opens its operations with 500 engineers, with plans to create additional roles over the next two years, across multiple functions including Internet of Things (IoT) and edge engineers, AI/computer vision scientists and engineers, data scientists and analysts and UI/UX specialists. With the addition of this new OpenBlue Innovation Centre in one of India’s biggest destinations for IT and engineering talent, Johnson Controls aims to make India a strategic hub to drive its security products.

“Our vision for the new OpenBlue Innovation Centre in Hyderabad, India is to further strengthen Johnson Controls comprehensive buildings security portfolio,” said Dave Pulling, president and general manager, Global Security Products, Johnson Controls. “The new OpenBlue Innovation Centre reinforces Johnson Controls commitment to innovation and delivering best-in-class solutions for smart, healthy and sustainable buildings – to India, from India.”

Johnson Controls presence in India spans 27 years and today Johnson Controls India stands strong at 6000 employees, with plans to further expand in the country over the next few years.