We all know that high-quality fibre connectivity increases the long-term value of your property, but many developers and landlords are now facing the problem of playing catch up with their broadband speeds.
To avoid this fate befalling you and your new commercial site, you should aim to get things right the first time round. Retrofitting a building with high-speed connectivity can be expensive, time-consuming and disruptive.
Pre-built, plug-and-play connectivity means faster leasing, lower friction for tenants and higher perceived value.
But what constitutes the ‘right’ amount? It’s a strategic and practical question.
Planning connectivity for new commercial properties: a strategic question
Building managers and developers scarcely need reminding about the importance of a digitally-enabled building.
The modern-day connection needs to seamlessly handle video conferencing, cloud-based working, Internet of Things (IoT)-connected devices, data analytics and more. Superfast speeds are a modern day tenant expectation.
Advances in cloud-based computing and AI-enabled tools present a real risk of underbuilding – where not enough capacity is introduced to accommodate future requirements. It’s a recipe for costly retrofitting and exasperated tenants.
Similarly, there’s the potential to drastically overbuild – that is, where more capacity is built than is required, leading to wasted capacity and capital (not to mention costly ongoing maintenance).
Planning around your tenants and their connectivity requirements
Use cases will fundamentally affect the capacity, speeds and network features you need to offer in your new building.
Multi-tenant spaces
For these types of buildings, you may need to include private lines. Requirements will typically start at 500 Mbps to 1 Gbps per tenant space, with the option to scale to 10 Gbps speeds.
You should plan for static IPs and secure remote access (VPNs). Take the fairly typical example of a legal or finance firm – they’ll likely require a private 1 Gbps private line with guaranteed uptime, with encryption for compliance purposes.
There may be high uptime expectations, making a zero-loss failover solution a crucial consideration. These levels of uptime can be backed up by being written into service level agreements (SLAs).
Serviced offices
Here, demand can be intense. An example might be a creative co-working space with 4K video calls, cloud-based activity and Internet of Things devices. You should pre-build a high-capacity bandwidth and intelligent traffic management.
Total capacity may be in the region of 5–10 Gbps, with Wi-Fi 6E throughout the building. This is a modern, future-proofed networking standard aimed at handling higher speeds and multiple devices across multiple users.
It may also be worth planning for multi-gig switching, guest and internal VLANs and scalable ports to accommodate fluctuating user counts.
Mixed commercial spaces
If your space is a retail environment, then you’ll need to consider multiple networks, point-of-sale systems and public customer Wi-Fi.
Speed expectations may not be so high: 50–300Mbps can suffice for individual small retail units, or 1 Gbps for larger tenants. Separate VLANs may be required for POS systems, CCTV and general internal use.
These types of spaces are highly site-specific, so requirements can vary drastically.
Future-proofing your space
Clearly, the best solution is one that anticipates (and meets) user needs in the first instance, but can also scale with their requirements and support emerging technologies as they evolve.
For example, with advances in AI tools, a co-working space running comfortably on 1 Gbps today may need a 10 Gbps connection in 10 years’ time.
It may be a wise decision to overprovision fibre infrastructure, while avoiding overbuild – your building could be equipped with a multi-gigabit backhaul (such as 10 Gbps fibre) to avoid a future retrofit, with potential to even scale up to 40 Gbps.
As we touched on earlier, supporting the latest wireless standards is a solid way to futureproof, too. This may mean Wi-Fi 6E access points, or at least the cabling to support them.
Your building could also support the move to smart office spaces – think sensors for lighting, temperature and occupancy – by enabling IoT sensors and building automation systems.
Not sure what constitutes the right level of pre-built connectivity for your users? We can help.
Create a connected, future-ready space with Optinet
Having connected over 200 buildings and 2,750 office spaces since 2016, we bring a unique understanding of the pain points and challenges faced by commercial building landlords, owners, developers and management teams.
Our average deployment time is only 48 hours and our full fibre network solutions have brought high-speed connectivity to some of the UK’s most prestigious buildings and organisations.
With over 6 in 10 commercial landlords in the UK already taking steps to improve the digital connectivity in their properties, you need to act to stay ahead of the pack.
To future-proof your property and design the ideal infrastructure to meet your users’ needs, register your building with our team today.