Cygnet West is Western Australia’s largest independently owned commercial real estate agency with 140 employees, proudly representing 25 nationalities and speaking more than 20 languages. Chief Executive Officer Imran Mohiuddin has led Cygnet West since 2003, when he became CEO of Colliers International’s WA operation. The firm is passionate about doing its best, delivering outstanding service and collaborating with clients, and prides itself on local collaborations, knowledge and expertise, as well as international partnerships and relationships. Cygnet West offers property management, valuation, research advisory and agency (buying, selling and leasing) services in all property sectors, including office, industrial, retail, residential, strata, hotel, retirement living, land and commercial. The firm has a demonstrated record of adding value for buyers and sellers, identifying opportunities and trends, and applying innovative technological solutions to improve clients’ results. Its customers include local and overseas investors and fund and portfolio managers.

In July 2021, Cygnet West undertook a comprehensive review of its real estate management systems to align them with its corporate vision to be innovative, agile, customer-focused and responsive. That review revealed the on-premises systems provided by its franchisor were holding the company back because those systems could not interact with myBuildings. MyBuildings is a system invented by Core Vision (a property technology company launched by Cygnet West CEO Imran Mohiuddin in 2001) that supports the buildings it manages, including services, maintenance (which it could track) and the firm’s work request system. Cygnet West wanted efficient, transparent systems to streamline business operations, dramatically reduce the amount of time staff spent performing manual tasks and, most importantly, have the capacity to offer clients real-time data for better-informed decision-making. To achieve this, Cygnet West implemented ab extremely tight five-month deadline to conduct a complete overhaul of its systems, adopt and build new elements, maintain quality service continuity for clients and train staff on the new systems.

Cygnet West transformed its MRI on-premise system to the cloud-based MRI-X system to integrate applications, reduce costs, improve strategic planning and automate processes at scale. The technology overhaul aimed to introduce cloud-based systems that could work together, connect to clients’ systems and incorporate innovations as they evolved. This overhaul allowed Cygner West to plug into its myBuildings technology, allowing MRI-X and myBuildings to talk to each other. Cygnet West could also link its clients to MRI-X, giving them real-time information about their assets’ performance. Additionally, Cygnet West wanted to address the issues they faced while their property managers invoiced tenants. During this technology overhaul, Cygnet West automated tenant communication using eConnect. With eConnect, invoices are sent from a central email and timestamped when opened, making it easier to follow up on arrears. eConnect attaches supporting information, and the process now takes two to three hours, delivering considerable savings of employee time and money and the environmentally friendly benefit of using less paper.

Overall, Cygnet West’s business technology transformation has delivered substantial productivity wins, automated manual processes and allowed the firm to reduce client expenses and redirect staff time and energy to strategy, to add client value. This change revolutionised property management and set a high bar for excellence in service delivery within the commercial real estate agency sector.

For information about Cygnet West, visit cygnetwest.com