Search Results for: cities

April 29, 2016

Start-ups help drive the rise in uptake of serviced offices in Australia ⁰

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, Flexible working, News, Workplace design

The number of flexible workspaces is growing in Australia, which has seen a 15 percent increase in new serviced offices and co-working spaces opening in the last year, according to data from Instant Offices. But the country still has some way to go when compared to other major international destinations for business, with only 300 such offices in total compared to more than 3,000 in the US alone. During the relative economic uncertainty of the past year – with growth limited to 2.5 percent however, Australia is now witnessing the growth of a “contingent” workforce. Small businesses of four employees or less make up more than three quarters of the total market, and considering that in two of the country’s commercial markets, Sydney and Melbourne, the typical entrance to the market has been via fixed lease of seven to 10 years in length; the agility offered by flexible workspaces is gaining in appeal.

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April 28, 2016

London’s office occupiers likely to move out to regions over next decade ⁰

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

The high costs associated with accommodating staff in London will lead to a trend over the next decade of office occupiers moving away from the capital to the major cities around the UK. This is according to the 2016 edition of property consultancy Lambert Smith Hampton’s annual Office Market Report, which highlights the significant and growing difference in premises, staff and housing costs between Central London and the UK’s other key cities. For cities such as Bristol, Manchester and Birmingham, staff and premises costs (including rent, business rates, day-to-day running costs etc) for a new-build office collectively amount to just over £50,000 per workstation. Measured on the same basis, a workstation in London’s Midtown area carries an annual cost of well over £80,000. In practice, this means that the overall cost of occupying a new-build office in a location such as Bristol for 500 staff stands at £27m per annum; in Midtown, the total cost would be over £13m higher each year.

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April 15, 2016

Office demand prompts rise in level of London commercial construction ⁰

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

London has reached the highest level of commercial construction since 2008, with activity totalling £7.4 billion. According to JLL and Glenigan’s latest UK Commercial Construction Index the level of speculative office development under construction in Central London totalled 8.3 million sq ft at the end of Q1 2016, well ahead of the long term average (5 million sq ft) indicating that developers are continuing to respond to London’s burgeoning requirements for new office floor space. In the West End office market alone, construction started speculatively on nine schemes in the first quarter of this year totalling 596,997 sq ft; the highest level of commencements since the end of 2014. The largest starts were at Brunel, W2 at 241,000 sq ft, which is scheduled to complete in 2019 and The Foundry, W8, a refurbishment planned to complete by the end of this year totalling 110,000 sq ft.

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April 12, 2016

London’s first timber skyscraper could be a step closer to reality ⁰

by Sara Bean • Architecture, Cities, Environment, Facilities management, News, Wellbeing

Londoners may reportedly be growing concerned over the proliferation of tall buildings, but what if they were constructed in wood, rather than steel and concrete? This is the possibility raised by researchers from Cambridge University’s Department of Architecture, who are working with PLP Architecture and engineers Smith and Wallwork, on the development of tall timber buildings in central London. The use of timber is an area of emerging interest for its potential benefits; the most obvious being that it is a renewable resource. Researchers are also investigating other potential benefits, such as reduced costs and improved construction timescales, increased fire resistance, and significant reduction in the overall weight of buildings. Mayor of London Boris Johnson has now been presented with conceptual plans for an 80-storey, 300m high mixed use wooden building integrated within the Barbican.

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March 31, 2016

Government needs to wise up to the Fourth Industrial Revolution ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Property, Public Sector, Technology

Last week, the UK Government passed the latest bill to pave the way for the creation of HS2, the high speed rail line that will initially connect London with Birmingham and later cities like Sheffield, Manchester and Leeds. Most of the criticisms of the line are focussed on its financial and environmental costs, impact on the wider rail network and (frankly poor) design. We can grant the project’s proponents all of their arguments countering those points and still we are left with a perhaps more fundamental problem. We are now committed to creating a train that will monopolise the resources available to public transport for the next twenty years and exist for more than a hundred, but without considering the world in which it will arrive. I’d go further and suggest that even as its tracks are laid, the world around it will already have left it behind, leaving it as an impressive but doomed testament to hubris, old tech and failure of imagination.

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March 31, 2016

Flexible workspace underpins Hong Kong’s status as Asia’s hub ⁰

by Sean Lynch • Cities, Comment, Flexible working, Property

Despite the challenging cost of real estate and general commercial life in Hong Kong, startup activity in the city has seen exponential growth in the last few years, fuelled in part by new and innovative approaches to occupying workspace. The conventional Hong Kong office market is, famously, the most expensive of its kind – making it challenging for small and medium sized businesses to enter the market via this form of space. Despite this, the region’s startup scene is booming. According to an InvestHK survey, over 1500 startups bloomed in Hong Kong in 2015, which is a 46 percent increase compared to the previous year. And those numbers are likely to keep growing. So the question is, how do cash-strapped entrepreneurs, startups and other businesses manage to establish a base in this thriving city, despite these challenges, and what lessons does Hong Kong’s experience have for the rest of the world?

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March 18, 2016

Increase in commercial office take up across Europe expected to continue ⁰

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property

The commercial property occupier markets across Europe recorded healthy improvements in activity during 2015, with the total take-up in the major office markets rising by 10 percent, according to Knight Frank’s latest European Quarterly Report. Although there was a drop in take-up in Europe’s two largest markets, London and Paris, this was made up by the strong performance of German, Iberian and Central and Eastern Europe markets. Commercial property rents rose by around 3.5 percent over the course of 2015, largely due to growth in markets such as Dublin, London, Madrid and Stockholm. Rental growth is expected to spread to a wider range of cities in 2016 with Paris, for example, expected to see prime office rents rise following more than two years of stability. A total of €64.5 billion was invested in European commercial property in Q4 2015, taking volumes for the full year to €238.5 billion. This represents a 25 percent increase on 2014.

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March 9, 2016

The nine workplace trends every organisation must learn to address ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, News, Wellbeing, Workplace, Workplace design

The latest company to set out its vision of workplace trends is food services provider Sodexo. The company’s 2016 Workplace Trends Report suggests there are nine key areas that managers should address, each linked by the common theme of striking the right balance between the organisation’s commercial objectives and the needs of its stakeholders. The report is a detailed meta-analysis based on primary research, client feedback and research from academics, trade associations and FM providers. The report covers the most talked about themes in workplace design and management including wellness, work-life balance, diversity, green building and workforce engagement. The authors acknowledge the challenge firms face in striking the balance between these complex and conflicting demands and call for an ‘holistic’ approach to resolve them (which may suggest they have as much of an idea about the right answers as anybody else).

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March 7, 2016

Government talks a good game on technology, then fails to deliver ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Flexible working, News, Technology

Last week, the UK Cabinet Office Minister Matt Hancock delivered a speech to the Institute of Directors, outlining details of the government’s Cyber First programme which aims to develop the skills needed to address the security threats posed by the digital revoluution. The speech was full of the usual stuff about the ‘interconnected world’. It even suggested at one point that the UK has ‘one of the most digitally advanced governments in the world’. Recent developments would suggest that this is slightly wide of the mark, to put it mildly. According to a February report from the regulator Ofcom, the UK’s broadband infrastructure continues to lag behind other countries, held back by BT’s characteristically inept and self-serving monopoly of cable infrastructure. Now the government has confirmed it scrapped its flagship mobile infrastructure project which set out to reduce the number of ‘not spots’ in the country.

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March 5, 2016

Boundless office + Well Buildings + Open plan design drawbacks ⁰

by Sara Bean • Comment, Facilities management, Flexible working, Newsletter, Technology, Workplace

In this week’s Insight Newsletter; Darren Bilsborough explains why Well Building is the new ‘green’ in building design; and Sara Bean finds open plan offices are not necessarily improving staff engagement levels. In news, the leading world cities are in danger of pricing out business tenants; the Chinese embrace Smart Cities as a route to rapid urbanisation; and employers really do attract and retain staff by offering flexible working. Why even the innovative Australians are facing challenges in keeping up with a fast evolving workplace; when technology at work doesn’t match that offered in many homes; and the digitisation of the office finally spells the dawn of a [nearly] paperless office. Download our latest Insight Briefing, produced in partnership with Connection, on how the boundless office can be freed from the shackles of time and place and access the latest issue of Work&Place. Visit our new events page, follow us on Twitter and join our LinkedIn Group to discuss these and other stories.

March 2, 2016

Employers’ attraction and retention rates rise with flexible working offer ⁰

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, Legal news, News, Workplace

Although a quarter of UK workers now regularly work out of the office, there is a still a significant number (39 percent) who don’t know they have the right to request flexible working. Yet according to new research from UC EXPO, conducted amongst 1,000 UK office workers, job roles offering flexible working are more likely to attract a better candidate, with 82 percent of workers saying they would be more likely to take a job that offered flexible working benefits. An additional 71 percent said that the offer of flexible working would help businesses to attract a greater international talent pool. The research finds that the benefits of flexible working are more widely recognised than a year ago, with a fifth (22 percent) of those surveyed having worked at home or remotely more throughout 2015 than in 2014. Productivity concerns around employees working from home is decreasing, with over two-thirds (67 percent) believing that productivity levels either increase or stay the same when they work remotely.

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February 26, 2016

War for talent and dwindling supply in London boosts regional office market ⁰

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property, Workplace

London office supply is at an all-time low according to JLL’s latest research, with around 18 million sq ft of offices required, but less than 7 million sq ft under construction. This is one of the reasons why 2015 saw a surge in pre-leasing activity across the Big 6 regional office markets, comprising Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Manchester, Glasgow and Edinburgh, with 850,000 sq ft let across 17 transactions compared with 15 over the five years from 2010-14. The survey shows that rental growth and refurbishment are key themes with refurbishment schemes totalling 800,000 sq ft will be delivered in 2016, with a further 10 new schemes totalling one million sq ft due to start. Greater convergence between HR and real estate also means the war for talent is a factor influencing occupier decision making. CEOs continue to cite a shortage of skills as a concern, as many Gen Z students are expected to leave their first job within a few years.