More-Space: Strategies and Methods to Improve Corporate Real Estate Management

The development of corporate buildings and the structure of workplaces changed dramatically during the last number of decades. Studies show that the utilization of e.g. office space lies at 5% over its lifecycle – so we need to rethink the design & the management of corporate facilities. In fact buildings which are heated, cooled and maintained but remain largely unused over time are economically & ecologically inefficient! Our built environment is identified as a crucial area for the realisation of the EU climate goals but the potential to reduce energy-demand and CO2-Emissions remain widely unused. Beside the opportunity to save a lot of (real estate and company/organisational) money through an optimized FM - the mentioned arguments above illustrate, that the improvement of space-utilization is also part of Corporate Social Responsibility. More-Space analyses saving potentials of e.g. flexible workplace management. Know-How from real estate development, facility management and mathematical modelling and simulation are brought together to improve and optimize space-utilisation. On going studies show impressive saving potentials up to 50% of the current workplaces and an optimised utilisation up to 80% within companies. Other studies within school buildings showed that up to 40% of the classrooms could be used for other purposes through improved space-management. These evaluations add up to massive saving potentials of user costs of buildings and tons of CO2-Emissions per year. The More-Space Tool is able to demonstrate each company its maximum benefit, as the model is customizable and supports rapid prototyping – a relevant characteristic for decision makers as managing directors, facility managers and others. The More-Space approach underlines that a successful achievement of the FM-potentials needs interaction between at least four competences: 1.Organisational development – necessary changes of processes and organizational structures; 2.Space Management - potentials e.g. within intelligent distribution of fixed-term rights of utilization but also within spontaneous occupancy; 3.Real Estate Planning/Development – Developers and designers must be able to create built infrastructures, which support dynamic usage of buildings and 4.Simulation – the high potentials for more efficient utilization often remain undetected until dynamic event-based computer-simulations facilitate, as the complexity of dynamic viewing of utilisation is extremely high.