Founded to save water designed as a platform.
SMART Watering Systems was founded by Chris Le Conte in 2007 to bring engineering discipline and documented outcomes to commercial irrigation. Seventeen years later, the company operates as Canada's water intelligence platform — managing outdoor irrigation and indoor water for 400+ commercial properties under a first-principles methodology that hasn't changed since the start.
A commitment that hasn't changed since 2007.
SMART was founded around what commercial property owners actually need: dramatic reductions in outdoor water use, elimination of the high-water-loss events that drive most indoor damage, and documented outcomes property managers can defend in front of a board. Seventeen years and 400+ properties later, the commitment hasn't moved.
In 2007, Chris Le Conte founded SMART Watering Systems with a focused commitment to commercial property owners: help them take measurable control of their water — both outdoors on the landscape and indoors in the building.
Flow sensing at every point of connection. Master valves at every connection point. Documented baselines on every site. The discipline that translates "we should save water" into "we saved 23,367 cubic metres on this property this year."
The approach produced exactly what institutional property owners had been waiting for: water savings they could measure, defend, and report — year after year.
By 2008, SMART was designing and installing the Yorkdale Mall landscape for Oxford Properties — a project that produced an 85% reduction in landscape potable water use and earned a 2008 Toronto Green Award. By 2009, Rosedale Property Management retained SMART as their lead irrigation consultant for the master planning of all future irrigation systems on the property. By 2013, the cumulative water savings at the RBC Mississauga corporate campus had reached 53,507 cubic metres.
Matthew Whalen joined as Partner and Operations Co-Owner, formalizing the company's scale-up. Today, SMART operates a 20-person in-house team serving the GTA + Golden Horseshoe — covering both outdoor irrigation and indoor water management for 400+ commercial properties under continuous measurement. Every install, every retrofit, every alarm response is performed by SMART staff.
The commitment hasn't changed since 2007. What you can measure, you can manage. What you can't measure, you can't justify.
Founded by Chris Le Conte.
SMART Watering Systems was founded by Chris in 2007. Seventeen years and 750+ properties later, he continues to set the standard that every SMART project is measured against.
Chris founded SMART Watering Systems in 2007 with a focused mission: help commercial property owners take measurable control of their water — both irrigation and indoors in the building. From the company's first project, the work has been driven by what clients needed: dramatic reductions in irrigation consumption, elimination of the high-water-loss events that drive most indoor damage and bill anomalies, and documented outcomes a property manager can defend in front of a board.
Chris currently sits as Chair of the Irrigation Sector Group at Landscape Ontario — the provincial association representing the landscape and irrigation industry across Ontario. He holds Certified Irrigation Contractor (CIC), Certified Landscape Irrigation Auditor (CLIA), and Water Smart Irrigation Professional (WSIP) certifications.
Over the past twenty years, Chris has built a portfolio of long-running partnerships with Canada's most forward thinking property owners and managers.
His focus today sits in two specific directions: helping clients achieve dramatic reductions in irrigation water use, and eliminating the high-water-loss events that drive most commercial indoor water damage. Both efforts share the same underlying SMART discipline — measure first, manage continuously, document every outcome.
What you can measure, you can manage. What you can't measure, you can't justify.
— The foundationational "why", 2007
Matthew has spent more than two decades in irrigation, starting as an installation crew member — trenching, pulling wire, setting heads. A Certified Irrigation Technician (CIT), he came up through the trade before running any part of it, and that still shapes how he reads a site and how he works with the people doing the work.
He joined SMART Watering Systems as General Manager in 2015 and became a Partner and co-owner in 2022. For over a decade he has led Operations and Major Projects, bringing precision to a trade that has historically run on instinct: scope, schedule, budget, and risk are managed the same way on a multi-site retrofit as they would be on any capital project.
Today that means directing the operations behind a portfolio of more than 750 commercial properties across Ontario — the crews and dispatch, the service standards, the reporting, and the financial management underneath it all. Operational excellence is not a slogan at SMART; it is the reason a client's fifteenth property gets the same execution as their first.
Chris sets the vision; Matthew builds the systems that hold it across both divisions — Irrigation and Water Management. On major projects and portfolio accounts, that means scoping the work, developing multi-year capital plans for aging irrigation infrastructure, and staying accountable for what was promised.
Water is the most honest reporting tool we have. It doesn't flatter, it doesn't estimate — it tells you exactly how well a system was built and managed.
— on SWS Operational philosophy
A 20-person team.
Built over twenty years.
Every project at SMART is delivered by a SMART employee. No subcontractor networks, no off-site labour. The team has been built one role at a time since 2007.
A strong team makes the difference.
Every install, every retrofit, every service call, every flow-alarm response is performed by a SMART Technician. We hire long, train deep, and keep institutional knowledge in-house.
Three divisions. One Team
Sean Knapman
Production Manager, Irrigation · 10 years at SMARTService Technician management, Field installation, Water-efficient Upgrades, Retrofitting, and seasonal service across Ontario.
Robby Duguay
Production Manager, Water ManagementRemote monitoring, daily alarm response, and water-management operations for both irrigation and indoor water portfolios.
Andrew Firth
Senior Irrigation Designer & Consultant · 15 years at SMARTSystem design and consulting for major landscape projects, working under Landscape Architects. CIT/CID-certified design grounded in fifteen years of SMART project history — the discipline behind every install before a single line goes in the ground.
Lindsay Clare
OperationsClient coordination, scheduling, reporting, and the operational backbone that keeps every field deployment and water-management response moving. The point of contact for property managers across the SMART portfolio.
Industry certifications plus manufacturer-level training.
- CIT Certified Irrigation Technician
- CIC Certified Irrigation Contractor
- CID Certified Irrigation Designer
- CLIA Certified Landscape Irrigation Auditor
- WSIP Water Smart Irrigation Professional
- Hydropoint Factory Level 4 certified
- Rainbird IQ Satellite-based remote control
- Hunter Hydrawise Cloud-based smart control
- 48 hours Flow alarm response, including weekends
- Same day GTA service call response
- Master valves Standard on every SMART system
- Flow sensing At every point of connection
- Documented baseline Pre-project and per-zone
Recognition
Awarded on what was measured,
not what was promised.
SMART's water efficiency work has been recognized by the City of Toronto, by our industry, and nationally — most recently on confirmed savings, verified by a third party.