Kevin Danehy Named CEO of North America at Willow

NEW YORK, April 28, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Willow, the leading provider of digital twin solutions for intelligent real estate and infrastructure, has announced Kevin Danehy as Chief Executive for their fast growing North American business, with Joshua Ridley as Global CEO.

In this new role, Kevin will lead the growth of the region across all verticals in Real Estate, Rail and other critical infrastructure, building upon Willow's blue-chip customer base.

Prior to joining Willow, Kevin served as Executive Vice President & Global Head of Corporate Development at Brookfield Properties for 9 years. In this role, he worked to accelerate revenue and asset value growth across a global portfolio and played a pivotal role in the identification, introduction, and deployment of new technology platforms. From 2019, Danehy was instrumental in the deployment of WillowTwin^TM on Brookfield's premier development, One Manhattan West, a project that has since led to him joining Willow.

"I am very excited to be joining the Willow team," said Danehy, "Our industry is at a major inflection point, Industry 4.0 is upon us and the rapid digitization of the built world is happening now. In my role at Brookfield, I had the opportunity to work with a number of different technology businesses but I see Willow as particularly unique in this space. Willow is placed at the centre of a technology shift for the built world and will fundamentally transform the future of real assets."

Joshua Ridley, Global CEO said "Kevin brings a wealth of experience in the North American market and shares our vision to digitize the built world. But beyond vision, we know first hand that Kevin has an ability to continually deliver to the expectations of some of the largest organizations in the world. Willow has a strong reputation for both vision and execution, and Kevin possesses both in spades."

Ric Clark, co-founder of WatermanClark commented on the transition to the technology space, "Kevin has an innate ability to identify new talent and opportunity. He will continue to be an industry leader in the next step of his journey. I've been a long time friend and collaborator of Kevin's, having worked with him for over ten years, I look forward to continuing this moving forward." 

The Commercial Real Estate industry has seen challenges since the pandemic, but PropTech has recovered quickly according to the MetaProp Global PropTech Confidence Index. In the latest edition of their bi-annual report (which provides in-depth insights into the health of the Real Estate tech market) they reported that Investor Confidence in PropTech has moved to a record high of 9.2/10, up from a previous ceiling of 8.8 in mid-2019. The report stated that 94% of investors believe that the pandemic will further accelerate the adoption of PropTech in the real estate industry, up 5% from mid-year 2020.

SOURCE Willow