TINLEY PARK, Ill. -- Panduit Corporation announced the opening of its new world headquarters building in Tinley Park, Ill., a suburb of Chicago. The building incorporates Panduit's Unified Physical Infrastructure (UPI) approach, which it says gives enterprises the capabilities to connect, manage and automate communications, computing, power, control and security systems for a smarter business foundation.
"Panduit's new world headquarters brings to life our vision for creating environmentally sustainable and healthy places to work," states John Caveney, CEO. "We set out with a mission to create the 'building of the future,' and we feel we've set a new precedent by combining state-of-the-art visibility and control for all critical building systems, sustainable energy, operational cost savings and intelligent design features - all aligned under a single unified infrastructure."
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The company says the five-story building comprises 280,000 square feet of office, conferencing and training space, enabling collaboration through open office concepts, shared work spaces, and the deployment of the latest technologies to connect internal and external employees, partners and customers. The space will initially serve 550 employees and is able to accommodate a total of 800. The company in total now employs over 4,000 people globally.
During the design phase, energy modeling showed that the LEED Design process will provide an estimated annual energy savings of 30% to 35%. In addition, UPI enabled Connected Building design principles will provide estimated operational savings of $0.63 per square foot.
UPI based elements of the building design include:
-- A smart data center, which showcases an intelligent infrastructure
that features high-speed data transport network infrastructure, energy
efficient heating and cooling, and data center virtualization,
enabling a 15% reduction in data center power costs and 38% reduction
in cooling costs.
-- Connected building architecture, which bridges key business
applications across the building, enabling convergence of physical and
logical systems onto a single network. This intelligence drives
efficiencies, visibility and control extending the reach of cabling
infrastructures to all endpoint devices for seamless integration of
building systems (including IP telephony, wireless connectivity,
digital media, and physical security).
-- The unique Unified Operation Center (UOC), which co-locates the world
headquarters safety, security, network, and communications operations,
enables close coordination and information sharing in a central
location. Moving to converged and IP based systems speeds
time-critical evaluation and response for improved workplace safety
and network service level agreements (SLAs). This consolidated
environment also reduces duplication, which results in a positive ROI
in both hard equipment and soft operational costs.
By collaborating with UPI Technology Partners such as Cisco, IBM, EMC, Emerson, Fluke, Haworth, Lutron, Oracle, and Tridium, Panduit says it was able to address challenges that cut across multiple business and technology domains.
"As the trend of building automation and IT convergence advances, the common vision we have developed with Panduit becomes even more relevant. Together we are helping to rethink the way that physical infrastructure is managed and are opening up new opportunities for our customers to place network-driven innovation at the heart of their business," said David Hsieh, VP Marketing, Emerging Technologies Group, Cisco.
Panduit teamed with leading global design, planning and strategic consulting firm Gensler, as well as with national engineering and construction firms Affiliated Engineers Inc., Continental Technologies, and Power Construction, to design this innovative building.
"Through our relationship with Panduit, we better understand that technology is a key component to sustainability - to monitor and control the building's energy use. We understand how the UPI vision can enhance LEED certification and will consider using this technology strategy on other projects," states Jay Longo, Gensler Senior Associate.
The building is expected to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold certification. In addition to the UPI based design, other features of Panduit's world headquarters that enhance the workplace experience and contribute to overall sustainability goals include:
-- The first application of light shelves with integrated window shades,
to help redistribute the sun's direct light deep into the building and
reduce the amount of powered lighting.
-- The first installation in Illinois of a water reclamation system in an
office building. This system collects rainwater from the roofs for
internal non-potable uses to enhance efficiency and environmental
responsibility, creating an estimated annual water savings of 910,000
gallons.
-- Reclaimed redwood from water towers, used for architectural wood
accents.
-- A green roof which protects the roof membrane from harsh weather and
ultraviolet radiation. This system insulates the building and
minimizes heat gain.
"The costs associated with the LEED criteria were approximately 2% of the total construction budget, and we expect to see these investments show a payback in less than five years," says Robert Smith, Director of Global Real Estate. "Our LEED Gold building design demonstrates our continued dedication to being an environmentally conscious manufacturer and our commitment to sustainability."
For more information, go to www.panduit.com.