Category: Projects

Margulies Perruzzi’s project for Home Base was recently featured in Healthcare Design Magazine’s “Monitor” section in the August 2019 issue. Visit this link to read the feature.

Originally posted in Medical Construction & Design Magazine

A renovation was recently completed for MelroseWakefield Hospital’s central sterile processing department. Located in Massachusetts, the renovation involved modernizing HVAC and sterilization equipment. The project team included Columbia Construction Company and Margulies Perruzzi. Multiple phases were developed and sequenced using Lean planning to maintain operations, avoid renovating and area twice, control costs and shorten the construction schedule. The project required air quality monitoring, humidity and pressure differential monitoring throughout construction to ensure the active operations of the department were never compromised and that FGI Guidelines were adhered. To ensure regular contact between the client and all team members, a communication strategy was developed for daily monitoring, response to system alerts and tracking documentation and reporting.

Originally published Fujifilm’s website

Lexington, Mass., July 10, 2019 – FUJIFILM Medical Systems U.S.A., Inc., a leading provider of diagnostic imaging, endoscopic imaging and medical informatics solutions, and FUJIFILM New Development, U.S.A., Inc., an innovative provider of minimally invasive surgical solutions, announced today they have opened the doors to their new company headquarters in Lexington, Massachusetts, a Boston suburb, one of the largest medical device and healthcare hubs in the United States. The modern, state-of-the-art, 28,000 square foot facility will play host to customers, partners and global colleagues while inspiring collaboration among Fujifilm employees.

“Placing our healthcare resources under one roof was a strategic move to foster close collaboration across various business units and enable us to improve the customer experience,” said Takaaki Ueda, President and Chief Executive Officer, FUJIFILM Medical Systems U.S.A., Inc. and FUJIFILM New Development, U.S.A., Inc. “This kind of collaboration is what spurs innovation and fuels our efforts to bring unparalleled new technologies to market and address pressing clinical and business needs while raising the standard of care and improving patient outcomes.”

The move signifies a major strategic step in Fujifilm’s long-term plan to further advance its leadership position in medical device and IT industries as well as the healthcare field at large.

The relocation also marks the first time Fujifilm’s various healthcare groups—computed tomography, digital radiography, women’s health, endoscopy, minimally invasive surgery, and medical IT—will be headquartered in a single location.

Located within the new company headquarters is the Fujifilm Healthcare Customer Experience Center, which showcases the power of Fujifilm’s integrated, comprehensive portfolio and its legacy of healthcare innovations and trailblazing “firsts”—all in one physical setting. The interactive space will offer product demonstrations, trainings and educational offerings for customers, employees and partners.

“At Fujifilm we are focused on the complete spectrum of healthcare, developing groundbreaking solutions that address the entire continuum of care—prevention, diagnosis and treatment,” said Jason Heim, Vice President, FUJIFILM Medical Systems U.S.A., Inc. “With collaboration at the forefront of all of our initiatives, we look forward to having a central location to more closely connect with our customers, other industry leaders, and importantly, one another.”

To commemorate the relocation, today Fujifilm is hosting its grand opening ribbon cutting ceremonyin its Fujifilm Healthcare Customer Experience Center. This event will signify this strategic milestone which brings Fujifilm’s various healthcare businesses under the same collaborative roof.

In addition to the company headquarters, FUJIFILM Medical Systems U.S.A., Inc. will still hold satellite offices in Morrisville, North Carolina, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Valhalla, New York and Wayne, New Jersey. As of April 2019, FUJIFILM Medical Systems U.S.A., Inc. no longer has offices in Stamford, Connecticut.

For more information please visit www.fujimed.com and www.fujifilmmis.com

Originally posted at Building Design + Construction Magazine

For its new headquarters, PTC, a market leader in Internet of Things and augmented reality systems, took an 18½-year lease on the top nine floors of the 17-story, 400,000-sf 121 Seaport building in Boston. The company’s goal for the elaborate fitout of that 250,000-sf space was to “make its headquarters a global model for excellence in the use of workplace technology.”

End-to-end collaboration between PTC and its Building Team was instrumental in achieving that goal. It started several months before construction began when project architect Margulies Perruzzi Architects (MPA) conducted visioning and commissioning sessions with PTC and its owner’s representative, Cresa. The client also engaged the MIT Center for Real Estate to evaluate the most appropriate technology options for the project.

Because PTC’s new headquarters would be 100% unassigned seating, the Building Team constructed 5,000-sf mockups of the proposed office spaces at PTC’s old headquarters in Needham, Mass., to show employees how the new workspaces would feel and function.

PTC began its fitout even as 121 Seaport was still under construction, so the Building Team had to maintain close coordination with the core-and-shell GC, Skanska Development. This resulted in modifications of some of the fitout’s mechanical design. MPA also chose flooring materials better able to accommodate moisture from recently poured concrete slabs.

To facilitate the project’s fast-track scheduling, PTC, Cresa, MPA, and the fitout project’s GC, Gilbane Building Company, signed a “Partnership Charter” that laid out the project’s goals, identified its chain of command, and specified its achievement metrics.

To address the elliptical shape of 121 Seaport, which was designed by CBT Architects, MPA created a “radial design” of the workspaces and lounges to align with the building’s oval shape. (The Building Team referred to the office design as “the yolk.”) Early subcontractor involvement was critical for the design and installation of curved glass interior walls and, especially, lighting fixtures that became a signature component of this fitout.

The new headquarters includes more than 200 technology-enabled collaboration and huddle rooms. Each of the nine floors has a space known as The Hive, which offers employees diverse experiences for casual meetings, socialization, and quiet time. Each Hive has a different “personality,” with soft seating, high-top tables, accent lighting, vending machines, and large flat-screen TVs that provide news feeds about local community events, weather information, and PTC employee and office highlights. Employees seeking privacy can schedule time in soundproof  “phone booths.”

The company’s 16th-floor boardroom features a table made out of wood from a shipwreck that was discovered during 121 Seaport’s construction.

But it is on the 17th floor that this fitout really shines, starting with an elevator lobby whose dynamic LED lighting immediately grabs visitors’ attention. The lobby leads to PTC’s Corporate Experience Center (CXC), a showcase for the company’s smart technology, such as its ThinkWorx IOT and Vuforia AR platforms. The CXC has more than 20 exhibit pods that tell stories about PTC’s products and applications. Each pod has its own conference room.

The CXC includes X-Factory, a replica of a factory floor complete with a viewing platform and industrial ambience, and a Reality Lab for testing and demonstrating up and coming technologies. Each of these spaces is interactive.

Facing the CXC on the other side of the 17th floor is a large café, The Common, which serves as a multipurpose space with lots of seating that can be used for company presentations and events. The Common offers catering space, a kitchen area, state-of-the-art A/V, and a high-end sound system.

The Common is connected to the building’s landscaped roof deck by a large, curved steel and glass stair with a glass headhouse.

PTC and MPA jointly evaluated the use of disruptive workspace technologies for gathering facility data to measure space utilization and heavy-use patterns in real time. The software used included CrowdComfort, which assesses occupant comfort; Steelcase’s Room Wizard, for conference-room scheduling; and Workplace Advisor, which measures the effectiveness of workspaces.

Building Team — Submitting firm Margulies Peruzzi Architects (architect), Client PTC, Owner’s project manager Cresa, MEP/FP/IT/security design BALA Consulting Engineers, SE McNamara Salvia Structural Engineers, Building envelope engineer Simpson Gumpertz & Heger, Landscape architect CRIA/IBI Group, Lighting design Sladen Feinstein Integrated Lighting, AV systems Communications Design Associates, Acoustical design Acentech, Exhibit design consultant Amaze, Design branding/graphics 96pt., Commissioning Fitzemeyer & Tocci Associates, Code consultant AKF Group, GC (interior fitout) Gilbane Building Company

General information — Size 250,000 sf, Construction cost Withheld at owner’s request, Construction time May 2018 to January 2019, Delivery method Design-bid-build

Originally appeared in TechTarget’s SearchHRSoftware

PTC’s entire image is built around practical applications of bleeding-edge technology. The maker of computer-aided design software and related tools for manufacturers was early to catch the IoT wave and more recently moved into virtual and augmented reality. Its website is chockablock with gorgeous 3D images of spacecraft, colorful cutouts of jet engines and shots of fit models staring intently at screens.

So, it’s not surprising that, when PTC relocated its headquarters from the Route 128 suburb of Needham, Mass., to a 17-story, elliptical glass high-rise in Boston’s booming Seaport District, it executed a digital workplace strategy that resulted in an office packed with eye-popping digital imagery, networked IoT sensors and sleek furniture — capped by a museumlike corporate experience center and employee cafe on the top floor. “They really viewed this move as very transformational for them,” said Tim Bailey, lead architect on the project and associate partner at Margulies Perruzzi, a Boston architectural and interior design firm. “They really wanted to show that they’re leaders in the technology that they produce.”PTC executives also saw the move as essential in attracting younger talent that tilts toward an urban lifestyle. In addition, it was a chance to reset the corporate culture and inspire employees to greater creativity with an open-office, activity-based design that offers a variety of workspaces for people to work individually or in groups.

While the still trendy open-office idea has been around for a while, the new PTC headquarters takes it a huge step further with a radical departure from walled offices and cubicles: 100% unassigned, or “free address,” seating. Workers have assigned floors and departmental “neighborhoods,” but when they arrive there, they check a wall monitor displaying Steelcase Live Map software to find open seats. Employees get a backpack and an assigned locker to leave their things and grab a wireless keyboard and mouse before heading to a workstation.

Moving from a suburban campus on a pond next to the Charles River to the hottest neighborhood in one of America’s most congested cities, plus the unassigned seating, required the 1,000 PTC employees in the headquarters to accept two major changes in their lives. PTC HR aimed to help employees adapt with a yearlong change management program that continues well past the Jan. 22 move-in day.

A moving employee experience

Facilitating the move to Boston was HR’s initial priority, according to Kathy Cullen-Cote, executive vice president and chief HR officer. “Even myself, when they first told me that we were going to be moving to Boston, I resisted,” Cullen-Cote said. “I think that’s important, as I rolled out the program, to remember that I felt some resistance.”Frequent communication was “a huge piece in the success,” she said. There were weekly newsletters about the Seaport move, and each month, one of the weekly socials was dedicated to answering questions. Rosa Mexicano, a restaurant in the Seaport, catered food, and WageWorks explained the commuting benefits PTC would provide. (It reimburses half the expense and hires a ferry to short-circuit traffic between a commuter rail station and the Seaport).

Glint pulse surveys provided managers and HR near-instant feedback about the move. Some employees were initially angry because they felt something was being taken away from them, according to Colleen Simonelli, vice president of diversity, inclusion and organizational development. “We wanted to get a sense of, post-move, how people were feeling,” she said. “We did a survey a couple of weeks after the move, and the results were positive.”Employees were asked to volunteer as Seaport champions, and a core team provided a way to give feedback to peers instead of escalating it to a boss. “We have very active employee resource groups here, and they’re very generous in volunteering in helping to shape our culture,” Simonelli said. A pre-move party was held in the new office. “We were trying to prepare everyone, get them excited [and] get their hearts and minds around what this would actually mean,” said Diane Young, senior director of global benefits and employee programs.On moving day, champions handed employees information packets and led them to their neighborhoods. “We had hundreds of people helping to support this,” Simonelli said. “It was really special. We had City Year volunteers that, when you walked into the building, they would cheer you. Imagine that you’ve just taken your new commute, you arrived at your new office, and you walk in, and there are 25 people clapping and cheering you on.”The long day ended with an after-party at a nearby Kings bowling alley. Change management “was really such a big piece of it — that did take a lot of time,” Young said. “Going into the project, you’re focused [more on] the tactical [part] of planning the move, picking the furniture, the design and all that, but the employee impact is really, really important. I can’t stress enough how much time should go into that.”

Acclimating to unassigned seating

Despite the disruption of the move, “there was probably the most noise around the open-office concept,” Cullen-Cote said. In Needham, most engineers had their own office, but at 121 Seaport Blvd., none of them would.

“In the first couple of days, it’s uncomfortable because, instead of going to your desk that you’ve gone to for however long, now, you have to go and find a locker and put your things down, and then you have to choose a desk,” she said. “Where are your friends sitting? What if I want to stand versus sit? What if I want two monitors, but there are no more seats with two monitors?”

A lot of thought went into choosing the best ratio between open seats and enclosed spaces, according to John Civello, vice president of corporate real estate and workplace. “We heard a lot of pushback immediately about how ‘it will be awful. I’ll never be able to find a place to have a private call,'” he said. “People have heard all the negative stuff about open plan and all the nightmare scenarios where a company would build out 100 seats and two huddle [small meeting] rooms.”

To avoid such horror stories, a typical floor in the new headquarters has one enclosed space for every four tables. “We really went over and above to make sure that we had enough of these private spaces that people could use when they needed to,” Civello said. “We haven’t really eclipsed 50% to 55% utilization on a given day. So, there’s plenty of private space for people.” PTC occupies nine of the 17 floors, and its lease guarantees room to expand.

Bailey said his firm used metrics from past projects to strike the right balance and asked employees how often they collaborate and make private calls. The 100% unassigned seating also forced a rethinking of the usual rules about the space needed for each person. One conclusion was that there should be a huddle room for every 20 people. “They had very private, siloed spaces in Needham,” he said. “We ended up bumping up the number of private spaces a little bit, just to offset that drastic change.”

“The tricky thing is, because they are 100% unassigned, we’re basically designing a space that can satisfy all of the departments,” Bailey said. “Some departments like legal and HR need more private space.”

To familiarize employees with the new work environment, HR ran discussion sessions and learning labs. Local office designer Red Thread, an authorized supplier of the furniture and audiovisual (AV) equipment maker Steelcase, set up furniture in Needham for workers to try. They could book a huddle room — affectionately renamed “cuddle rooms” — or use a “phone booth” to make a call. They could rate the spaces on CrowdComfort online software. Employees were also given the chance to name kitchen areas, called “hives.”

Digital workplace strategy for global collaboration

The building is outfitted with products from PTC customers, making the vendor’s industrial design and IoT tools the foundation of its digital workplace strategy. Steelcase used Creo 3D computer-aided design software to design the furniture, for example, and the building controls are from Schneider Electric, an early user of PTC’s ThingWorx IoT platform.

Employees experience the digital workplace strategy as soon as they enter the ground floor. Otis Elevator Co. control panels require riders to press the floor icon three times if three people are going to the same destination and then scan their badge. Algorithms assign cars to meet demand in the most efficient way. Later this year, a Steelcase Live Map smartphone app will let workers spot open seats before they reach their floor.

Another Steelcase program, RoomWizard, enables reserving of meeting rooms. Heat sensors and motion detectors can tell when reserved rooms and workstations are unoccupied, and after a few minutes, Live Map will make them available. Aruba wireless access points provide Wi-Fi — and, soon, beacons for proximity awareness and wireless apps — atop a Cisco network backbone. Cloud telephony from Boston-based Fuze connects voice over IP on smartphones and PCs to the standard telephone lines in conference rooms. Every workstation has dual monitors that remember user settings, and most conference rooms have Cisco WebEx whiteboards.

A really cool place

Civello expressed amazement at how the planning and plug-and-play technology made for a speedy move. “That afternoon, in my floor, everybody was working. I’ve been in this business for 25 years, and when you do a move like this or a corporate headquarters, it usually takes five days for people to unpack and set their PC up. With this move, people just showed up with a backpack, plugged in and went to work.”

Young said the unassigned seating has fostered collaboration. “People are just walking over and getting things done very quickly. They’re talking, meeting. It’s formal and informal,” she said. “It’s just a much more collaborative workspace than it ever was before.”

For Cullen-Cote, “the environment is so energized. It’s just bright and shiny, and people are smiling more.” One employee described it to her this way: “It’s like getting a new job in a really cool place and bringing all your friends with you.”

Our project for Home Base won the Best Practice Award for a Medium Sized Project at IFMA’s Boston Chapter award ceremony! Congratulations to Home Base and thank you for all you do to help our veterans!