Commercial real estate is evolving quickly. Many properties that were once single-purpose office buildings now operate as mixed-use environments that combine offices, retail, hospitality, coworking, and other shared amenities.
This evolution has exposed a growing weakness in many buildings installed with legacy access control systems that still rely solely on physical cards and key fobs.
For decades, access management in commercial buildings relied on badge printing, physical distribution, and manual security processes. But in today’s complex and dynamic properties, where thousands of people may enter and exit daily, these systems create operational friction.
Open standard mobile credentials that offer flexibility for deployment, as a result of being able to work with legacy access control systems and wider platforms, are emerging as the solution. SaaS companies like Sentry Interactive are a provider of this type of open mobile access credential. By allowing building occupants to use their smartphones as secure access keys, and making the administration of access credentials a remote and simple task, commercial property operators are rethinking their access technology across entire building portfolios.
Modern mixed-use buildings require dynamic access solutions
Mixed-use developments operate very differently from traditional office buildings.
Instead of a single tenant with predictable access needs, property managers must coordinate entry for a constantly shifting mix of users:
- Office employees
- Retail staff
- Visitors and guests
- Delivery drivers
- Contractors and service vendors
- Cleaning and maintenance teams
- Facilities management and building security teams
Each group requires different access privileges, often across multiple areas of the building, office floors, elevators, parking garages, maintenance and cleaning cupboards, server and security control centre rooms, security maintained equipment closets, control centre rooms and shared amenity spaces.
Managing these relationships with physical credentials quickly becomes inefficient. Lost badges require reissuing. Temporary visitors require manual check-in. Security teams spend hours each week distributing and replacing cards.
This is why many commercial real estate operators for mixed-use properties are beginning to rethink the access credentials they are issuing for their building’s security. The need for a digital solution that offers flexibility when choosing their next move is evident.
The shift to mobile credentials, an expected tenant experience
Mobile credentials offer building occupants with a convenient alternative to juggling physical cards and keys.
Instead of picking up a badge from a security desk, users receive a mobile credential that can be used to access all the doors in the building they require access to. This can be received and activated remotely and instantly to an app on their smartphone.
With mobile credential software solutions like Sentry Interactive’s, users simply receive an email with their mobile credential, which they can activate, and start unlocking doors that they have been granted permissions instantly to using their smartphone’s Near Field Communication (NFC) tap-to-unlock technology, QR code scan, or an iOS or Android widget. Sentry Interactive’s NFC mobile credentials don’t require new reader hardware, they interact with Sentry’s Smart Access Tile, a wireless, and battery-free passive NFC tile that can be applied easily next to a door to activate the credential.
Visitors, contractors, cleaning and maintenance teams, or in fact anyone that requires temporary access can also be granted a digital visitor pass. The host simply enters the time frame and the doors they will require access to and an email containing the credential information will be sent directly to them. They can either download the app to access their pass where they can unlock using NFC, or they can simply access using an app-less visitor pass, allowing them to scan a QR code to unlock a door via a web browser. Once their allocated time is up, access is instantly and automatically revoked, avoiding any risk of them forgetting to return their temporary access pass, which could lead to future security breaches.
For building operators and property management teams, the value goes far beyond convenience. Mobile credentials can be issued, updated, and revoked remotely and instantly, reducing the need for manual badge management and storage. This saves administration teams lots of time, and allows them to provide output in other ways to deliver more value to the business. In environments where tenant needs and occupancy frequently changes, this level of flexibility becomes a major operational advantage.
Security benefits beyond the physical access card
While physical cards have long been the standard for building access, they come with inherent limitations.
Cards can be lost, shared, or duplicated, and once they leave a user’s possession, it becomes difficult to control how they are used, and by who.
Mobile credentials introduce stronger security protections. As they are stored on smartphones, they benefit from built-in device security such as passcodes, biometric authentication, and encryption. Software solutions like Sentry Interactive’s take mobile credential security to the next level, leveraging asymmetric encryption for the transfer of user unlock data from the phone, to the cloud, to the on-prem access control system.
Administrators also gain greater control. If a device is lost or an employee leaves a tenant’s organization, credentials can be revoked immediately from a central dashboard eliminating any risk of unauthorized access.
For mixed-use commercial buildings balancing convenience and security, mobile access offers a modern alternative to traditional badge systems, while reducing the operational burden that comes with managing physical credentials.
Modernization doesn’t have to come with cost and complexities
For many owners of mixed-use commercial buildings, the challenge with modernizing access isn’t the value of mobile credentials, it’s the cost of replacing existing systems across large, complex properties.
A mixed-use building may include dozens of entry points spanning office floors, retail areas, parking garages, service corridors, and shared amenities. Replacing all access hardware across these environments can appear to require a significant capital investment.
Solutions like Sentry Interactive’s mobile credential software address this challenge by working with existing access control infrastructure rather than requiring a full system replacement. By integrating using API’s and an SDK with current access control platforms and compatible hardware, property operators can introduce mobile credentials without needing to rip and replace their entire system.
With Sentry Interactive’s integration with the building’s access control system it enables the choice of mobile credentials to coexist alongside physical credentials. It doesn’t have to be a hard transition, it’s an option for the building facilities team to deploy to specific tenants and staff, contractors that are requesting mobile access or would most benefit from it.
This approach allows building owners to roll out mobile access strategically, whether starting with a single building entrance, tenant group, or amenity area, while continuing to support traditional physical credentials during the transition.
For mixed-use commercial properties managing diverse tenants and high traffic volumes, this phased approach makes it possible to modernize access in a way that aligns with both operational scalability and long-term return on investment.
