Singapore’s uHoo eyes PHL growth as offices go green

UHOO, a Singapore-based company providing indoor environmental quality monitoring and management solutions, is banking on the growing demand for sustainable office and industrial spaces to strengthen its presence in the Philippines, according to its chief executive officer (CEO).

“The demand is flight to quality, and if you’re not in that space of quality, the value of your building drops — you cannot get tenants, and you’re just going to lose money,” Dustin Jefferson S. Onghanseng, co-founder and CEO of uHoo, told BusinessWorld  last week.

“Eventually, clean air will become a basic right in any building.”

uHoo specializes in indoor air quality sensors, providing real-time insights into key environmental factors such as temperature, humidity, air quality, noise levels, chemical pollutants, and various particle sizes.

This enables building owners, managers, and tenants to maintain healthier, more comfortable indoor environments while enhancing building performance.

“At the end of the day, it’s really a rent increase that property owners want — tenants who are willing to pay more and commit to a longer-term contract,” Mr. Onghanseng said.

“And to achieve that, you need to have the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) and WELL Building Standard certifications. Those are the two certifications we help our clients achieve.”

Real estate developers rely on green building certifications to ensure their projects meet environmental standards and sustainability benchmarks.

As of end-September last year, the volume of office space transactions in green-certified buildings, such as those with LEED and WELL certifications, doubled to 293,900 square meters (sq.m.) from 151,900 sq.m. a year earlier, according to property consultancy firm Colliers Philippines.

The Metro Manila office market is projected to have approximately 722,000 sq.m. of green-certified space by 2027, it added.

In January, uHoo secured $3.7 million in fresh funding to support its business-to-business expansion in the Asia-Pacific. A portion will also be allocated for developing new hardware and software products.

“The capital we raise is purely for expansion, both in technology and in securing clients,” Mr. Onghanseng said.

uHoo has clients in the Philippines, Singapore, Japan, Australia, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, the United States, Ireland, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Canada, and Germany.

In the Philippines, uHoo primarily operates in Metro Manila’s office sector and Laguna’s industrial sector.

According to Mr. Onghanseng, awareness of air quality’s importance remains a key challenge in the Philippines.

“Generally, people take the air they breathe for granted,” he said, noting that air quality affects workers’ health and productivity.

The Philippines’ air quality worsened to 14.8 micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m³) from 13.5 μg/m³ recorded the previous year, according to the 2024 World Air Quality Report by Swiss air quality technology company IQAir.

This remains well above the World Health Organization’s prescribed annual average of 5 μg/m³.

Mr. Onghanseng said investing in sustainable building solutions is not costly for developers in the long run.

“If you invest in making a building LEED- and WELL-certified, the additional cost of investment is minimal compared to the valuation gain you will get,” Mr. Onghanseng said. — Beatriz Marie D. Cruz