Turning up the dial on connectivity
Freshwave are sponsoring season 11 of the #Workbold podcast which is a podcast dedicated to space-as-a-service (SPaaS). Sanj Ranasinghe, WiredScore’s Global Director of Research and Development, is interviewed in the latest episode which is recorded in 22 Bishopsgate, a building that not only has a WiredScore and SmartScore Platinum rating, but is also one of Freshwave’s customers with mobile connectivity from all four mobile network operators.
WiredScore is the organisation behind the WiredScore and SmartScore certifications: the only global digital connectivity and smart technology certifications for homes and offices. They have been operating for 10 years now and, as Sanj says in the podcast, when they first started out their mission was to solve a problem where landlords didn’t understand how good their connectivity could or should be, and tenants didn’t recognise how important the internet was to them.
“That sounds really strange now looking back at it; we all know now that we need the internet everywhere we are, every day. And so our business has evolved over time: today we set the global standard for best-in-class digital connectivity and smart building design with a sharp focus on occupier experience. That covers internet through to Wi-Fi and mobile, and cutting-edge smart solutions,” Sanj said.
For new buildings, the end user experience has become much more important in office real estate wanting to attract people back into the workplace. For those setting out to build a great experience, they often don’t know who their tenants will be. And they can’t wait until the tenant signs their lease to build a tech stack for them as it’s both time consuming and very expensive. The certifications provided by WiredScore act as a framework to design to.
When it comes to retrofitting buildings to deliver from both a sustainability point of view as well as a great user experience, landlords are facing competing priorities. “We’re finding ESG is a really good lens to look through at technology strategies when retrofitting,” said Sanj. “Technology underpins the environmental, social and governance aspects one way or another. Balancing focus on all three outcomes isn’t always easy, but is the right way.”
And WiredScore adds a fourth letter to the ESG mix, which is R for resiliency. “We believe that technology resiliency enables buildings to deliver against those three [ESG] outcomes… Resilient technology approaches are the key foundation that will enable landlords to drive where they want to go on their ESG agenda.”
These are just some of the highlights of what was discussed during the podcast. You can listen to the whole episode on Apple Podcasts here or other podcast platforms here.
We’ve surveyed hundreds of buildings to assess signal levels and quality for each mobile network operator in order to meet WiredScore certification. Contact us to find out more.