Digital strategy and AI critical for real estate companies
Digital transformation is becoming an urgent priority for real estate owners and occupiers as artificial intelligence reshapes operating models, according to Daniele Di Fausto, chief executive officer at eFM.
Speaking to Real Asset Media at EXPO Real 2025, he said the sector is only now beginning to confront the scale of change required.
“The market is starting, so digital players, especially in the real estate, are far behind digitalisation, but now artificial intelligence is coming, and some clients are preparing for the new journey,” he said. “There are three reasons that real estate, especially for corporations, is a non-core function. So, they invest more in the production side, in the core business, and not in the real estate.”
He added that digital adoption has been held back by organisational silos and a historical lack of pressure to cut costs. “Now the situation has completely changed, so we are living in a crisis, and companies are trying to adapt easily; otherwise, they will be out of the market.”
Di Fausto said the most immediate benefit for clients is the speed of decision-making. “The level of ability to change in getting information, in processing and getting fast results is one of the key drivers. After some time that they are using, the other point is productivity. And, so, efficiency is a consequence of the adoption.”
Yet cultural resistance remains one of the biggest obstacles. “Even internally, they are struggling to have training and explaining the benefits of this approach to the employee. And the reason why is that AI will even cut a lot of jobs. And, so, the adoption has even negative consequences in the employment of the people.”
eFM is working with major corporates undergoing large-scale transformation. “We have different big clients in Germany. One of the biggest is Bosch. So, we have corporations that have millions of sq m, and they are facing this transformation, so they are using eFM in order to make a transformation in the digital estate,” he said.
“In the United States, even we have big clients like Samsung, San Diego Gas & Electric.”
Banks across Europe are also reconsidering how branches should operate in a digital environment. “It’s very important to start with a pilot project to prove the value of the technology and then to prepare the scalability,” he said. “What we are seeing is that most of the companies are building digital agents for their employees.”
Demographic pressures add urgency. “In the next five years, the workforce in Europe will be half. So, the big problem that we will face is the number of people with a technician background [who will retire]. No new people coming from university,” he said. “How we can face the loss of knowledge and how AI can be another [resource] to help this transition and not losing the knowledge and helping us to increase the productivity?”
He expects hybrid human–AI teams to become commonplace. “In the next five years, we will have a lot of teams hybrid with normal people and digital agents to be managed in an integrated way. And this will be a cultural issue for a manager to have an employee and agents to manage together.”
Di Fausto warned that companies that delay action risk falling behind. “It’s becoming a necessity not to postpone the adoption of digitalisation. Without data, it’s not possible to have a digital strategy,” he said.
“More they will start, more they will learn. But if they do not start, they will lose the competition to others very, very soon. So not having a strategy in place with artificial intelligence in real estate can cost millions of euros to the company that will start in one year or two year time frame.”
