The Venue

This year, the Housing Technology Conference celebrated its 14th anniversary at the East Midland Conference Centre, after outgrowing its previous venue, The Oxford Belfry, from recent growth and popularity in the social housing space.

While we felt there were some drawbacks, the overall move was a positive one and the larger exhibition area undoubtedly allowed for more suppliers to showcase their products and services across the two days. This decision from Housing Technology meant the event was ideal for delegates, but it is also worth noting that it may have made the conference seem less exclusive for suppliers, even more so if they have attended in previous years.

The Conference

Despite moving venues and welcoming more people this year, the footfall felt more manageable for a lot of attendees. With this in mind, we feel like this could allow the conference to grow even further and extend its coverage, which is super exciting to see, and the future does look promising for our friends at Housing Technology.

One of the things we were most excited about this year was setting up our stand in the new venue. Our position at Stand 1 really allowed us to get involved with the active discussions and networking, two things that felt better this time around given the extended interior space which was better sized to accommodate the numbers. 

This meant that the almighty Active Housing Pinball machine could be experienced in its full glory, and it wasn’t long before attendees started battling for the high score, with the anticipation of taking home their own prize of a mini arcade machine!

(Image: A shot of our pinball machine in action at the event)

A big shoutout goes to Ben from Esuasive for getting the top high score of 48 million on the first day, which would end up becoming the number to beat moving into the second. Unfortunate for some, no other players were able to beat him, which meant he not only took home the grand prize, but also bragging rights for events to come.

(Image: Our Client Liaison Cath Davis seen with Ben, the pinball champion at Housing Technology 2023!)

Will the pinball machine return at another conference in 2023? You’ll just have to wait and see! Jokes aside, we were very happy to see that our pinball machine was well-received, and we can confirm that everyone had an enjoyable time while at our stand. 

The best part about our stand this year though, was also the fact that everyone was a winner. Those that were unable to beat the challenging score of 48 million, still managed to get a free drinks voucher in addition with exchanging topical and engaging conversations with the Active Housing team.

(Image: Active Housing Managing Director, Stephen Hall with Head of Sales and Marketing, Simon Wilkes in front of the Active Housing stand.)

Our first day at the event also saw Active Housing Managing Director, Stephan Hall, take to the stage in Conference Room 1 as he discussed the top five digital self-service mistakes by housing providers – a talk which sparked the buzzing interest of other attendees, that also led to conversations in the conference room and outside. A huge thank you to everyone who attended!

Moving into the second day at the conference, it did feel slightly quieter than the first (potentially due to the snow), but this didn’t take away from the event. The networking and social aspects pulled through as always from those a part of this lovely community – individuals who are continuously working hard and helping digitally transform the social housing sector alongside ourselves.

Hot topics

Coming into this event, we knew that there would be a lot of open-ended discussions surrounding technology and how it can be used to combat damp and mould. This was a huge talking point, and while the industry is moving in the right direction to combat this issue, there is still a long way to go, however we remain confident that the right advances are being made, and we’ll continue to fight this problem that still surrounds social housing.

Taking the top spots as most talked-about topics this year was cyber security and how cloud technology can be leveraged in our sector. With many organisations already taking advantage of cloud services, discussions revolved around how best to secure these services while ensuring that customer data remains safe and protected. This continues to be a talking point even outside of the event.

Another trend which we were also happy to see, was that more suppliers this year were working together as partners to provide a best-of-breed approach. This was exemplified by the collaborative seminar session delivered by NEC and Switchee, as well as the efforts of Manifest and Fast Lean Smart (FLS) who both promoted us and other partners. We particularly enjoyed discussing the real-time scheduling technology by FLS, and it makes us proud to be an approved FLS partner.

(Source: Our friends at the Manifest stand - courtesy of Simon Spriggs, Senior Sales & Partnerships Manager at FLS)

Surprisingly, self-service wasn’t a major focus at this conference, with only a few specialist suppliers exhibiting and in-attendance. However, many organisations did mention that they were considering a review or replacement of their self-service solutions, which is great to see.

We saw a similar trend when it came to chatbots – a topic which has always been heavily discussed while at previous conferences.  Although, briefly mentioned in some of the seminar sessions they weren't the hop topic of previous years, potentially suggesting that this technology has had limited success in the sector so far. 

What was clear to most though, was that Microsoft continues to be the dominant supplier to the sector, even with a few organisations starting to explore Google Workspace solutions, and others trialling Amazon services such as AWS.

Conclusion and thank you!

Attending the Housing Technology Conference was a truly positive experience for all the team at Active Housing. We really enjoyed networking with like-minded individuals and enjoyed discussing the latest technological advancements in the sector. 

The new venue also provided the perfect setting for us to do this, and it was great to speak with fellow industry experts to tackle some of the difficult challenges being faced such as damp and mould, net zero and the cost of living crisis. Our appreciation also goes to all of our clients and attendees who spoke to us while at the event - we hope you enjoyed the conference as much as we did.

Not only that, we also look forward to continuing our battle against these challenges and eagerly anticipate the next conference to continue the conversations being had and look forward to exploring new opportunities for innovation and collaboration in social housing.

If you would like to continue discussions we had at the event, please get in touch. We would love to hear from you!