Gala Dinner EFMC 2013 [watch]

EFMC 2013 Friday, second day of the conference [watch]

Duesseldorf/Prague, June 2013 – “It is time that we look at Europe as a whole.“ This statement by Peter Prischl, Managing Director at Reality Consult, is one of the major outcomes of this year‘s European Facility Management Conference (EFMC) which took place from 22 to 24 May in Prague (www.efmc-conference.com). 650 delegates from 37 countries in Europe and abroad had come together at Prague Congress Center to listen to the presentations of around 82 speakers from 20 countries and to exchange their Facility Management (FM) experiences with fellows, colleagues, and friends. ?Facility Management for a Sustainable Future“ was the overall motto of the Business Conference and the Research Symposium, and there were other important topics like future workplace management, outsourcing of services, facilities‘ life cycle cost, the EU standard for FM, and the industry‘s situation in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). This year‘s program was even more concise and focused on practice-oriented case studies than in the past.

Building bridges between people, disciplines, and nations
EFMC 2013 was being held under the patronage of Czech Republic‘s Prime Minister Petr Ne?as and hosted by the International Facility Management Association (IFMA) and the European Facility Management Network (EuroFM). Local hosts were the Czech IFMA chapter and the Slovak Facility Management Association (SAFM). With sustainability being the leading principle of the event, EFMC 2013 was carbon neutral: The CO2 emissions related to the congress and trade fair have been offset by supporting a certified climate project, which was made possible by Sustainability Sponsor Johnson Controls. The sustainability sponsoring package also comprised an online ticketing system that helped to save a lot of paper for printing plus tickets for public transport that were free of charge for all the participants. Platinum Sponsors were IBM as Solution Provider and ISS as Facility Provider, Gold Sponsors were Okin Facility and Sodexo. Furthermore, the event was sponsored by Eurest Services and Ecophon Saint-Gobain and supported by TriGranit and GC System. Apart from the sponsors, AB Facility, Archibus, Bilfinger HSG International Facility Management, CFI, Ika Data, Kaba Gallenschütz, MainManager, Manhattan, McFelder, MCS, Planon, Procos, and Topdesk presented their FM solutions at the exhibition.

„Facility Management is about building bridges and bringing people together“, said Ron van der Weerd, Chairman of EuroFM, in his welcome speech. ?EFMC links clients and suppliers, FM practice, research, and education as well as disciplines, hierarchies, generations, countries, cultures, and continents.“ Ond?ej Štrup, President of IFMA Czech Republic, added a historical dimension: ?20 years ago, in 1993, Czechoslovakia was separated into Czech and Slovak Republic. The states are now divorced, but we are still friends, and the FM associations of both countries are hosting EFMC 2013 together.“ There was also a strong collaboration with the Romanian, Bulgarian, and Hungarian associations, Štrup pointed out.

New EuroFM CEE group to be established
To increase cooperation and exchange of ideas between the associations, Cristian Vasiliu, Managing Director at ROFMA, accounted a dialogue platform desirable. Thomas Mitchell of Booz Allan Hamilton assented: ?Organizations must come together, and there is no other body in Central and Eastern Europe on this purpose than this discussion round, so it is right here that such a communication platform must be established.“ Peter Prischl suggested that delegates from the respective national associations should attend the annual meetings of other CEE associations, and József Czerny recommended a new CEE group within EuroFM. Professor Dr Alexander Redlein promised that EuroFM would take care of a new CEE group and invite the regional members to an initial meeting.

New bridges
Ali Al Suwaidi, Vice President at Idama Facilities Management, spoke about FM in tall buildings and stated that 15 percent of all skyscrapers in the world were located in the Middle East region. He pointed out that strategy had to come before technology, and he got back to the overall motto of EFMC 2013: “Sustainable FM is the answer to the future“, he proclaimed. Thus, in his closing speech, Ron van der Weerd of EuroFM again referred to his idea of building bridges and declared that during the conference he had even discovered a new bridge: that one to the Middle East.

The next EFMC is going to take place from 4 to 6 June 2014 in Berlin, Germany, featuring the motto: “Innovation, Integration, Vision“.

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Contact:
Julia Batzing
Senior-Pressereferentin
Informa Exhibitions, a division of Euroforum Deutschland SE
Prinzenallee 3
40549 Düsseldorf
Telefon: +49 (0)2 11/ 96 86 – 33 81
Telefax: +49 (0)2 11/ 96 86 – 43 81
E-Mail
Internet: www.euroforum.com

Picturegallery

• Trend towards streamlining and upgrading of FM
• Debate on insourcing and outsourcing
• Trendsetting input from research and practice
• General programme with social and tourist highlights

Düsseldorf/Prague, 29 April 2013 – The benefits of Facility Management (FM) for companies are undisputed, but differences of opinion exist regarding the organisation of services related to buildings, facilities and infrastructure. The question of “insourcing or outsourcing” has been a controversial topic in the industry for years, which is why the European Facility Management Conference (EFMC), which is taking place in Prague from 22 to 24 May 2013, will be devoting itself to this issue in its “Debate of the Year” (www.efmc-conference.com). Wilfried Hauffen of Baxter Germany, Jan Dunkelberg of Bilfinger HSG International Facility Management, Andrew Price of ISS, Thomas Polinelli of IWC, Luis A. Morejon of Deutsche Bank and Hans Rijnierse of Sodexo will be discussing when, why and which FM services are better provided internally or better procured from external providers. The debate will be moderated by Prof. Alexander Redlein of Vienna University of Technology, whose team conducted a survey of leading companies in Austria regarding the organisation of FM services, together with the Real Estate User Group, last year.

Conference programme reflects current study results
As reported in the “Immobilien Zeitung”, the study identifies two major trends among other things: on the one hand, a development towards smaller and leaner FM departments and, on the other hand, organisational upgrading of FM, since responsibility for FM lies with the second level of management at more than half of the companies surveyed. According to the study, 87 per cent of the top 500 companies in Austria have their own FM department; in more than half these cases the FM department numbers a maximum of five employees. Almost two-thirds of the FM departments coordinate three to ten external service providers, almost a third have to control more than ten service providers, while six per cent only work with one or two external partners. According to the study cleaning, winter maintenance and waste disposal are mainly outsourced as are, increasingly, technical servicing and maintenance. Services relating to air conditioning, ventilation and heating are again increasingly being provided by the companies themselves. The term of the service contracts is shortening noticeably.

In the survey, the FM managers indicated cost reduction, sustainability and cost transparency as their primary objectives, and environmental protection, flexibility and guaranteed value were also mentioned as important targets. These topics will also be addressed by the EFMC’s technical programme which brings together the latest findings from science and FM practice. The motto of this year’s conference is “Facility Management for a Sustainable Future”. A total of more than 700 visitors from around the world are expected to converge on Prague Congress Centre for the international conference. Around 70 speakers from 20 countries will be speaking at the Business Conference and Research Symposium. The EFMC is being organised by the International Facility Management Association (IFMA) and the European association EuroFM, while the event is being hosted locally jointly by the Czech section of the IFMA and the Slovak industry association SAFM.

Industry event promotes growth of knowledge and networking
Surrounded by vineyards at Prague Castle, Villa Richter will be the setting for the welcome reception for conference delegates on 22 May. Starting at 6:00 p.m., the welcome reception will allow visitors to socialise and prepare for the following two days of the conference. In addition to plenary sessions and parallel talks covering topics such as sustainability, FM in the public sector or the working methods of the future, this year’s EFMC will also feature round table discussions allowing interactive and professional exchanges, a gala dinner in Žofín Palace on the evening of 23 May, during which the “European FM Awards” will be awarded, and a poster session organised by European FM students. A job fair will bring together job offers and applications, while current scientific documents will be available to participants in the “Educational Corner”. Any delegates wishing to extend their stay in Prague can select from an exclusive range of excursions and tourist highlights from 18 to 26 May.

EFMC 2013 is being sponsored by ISS, IBM, OKIN, Sodexo and Johnson Controls as well as Eurest Services and Ecophon Saint-Gobain. “IBM is proud to be a platinum sponsor of the European Facility Management Conference. The event will be very important for us, because we will be launching our Integrated Workplace Management Solution (IWMS) in the presence of customers, colleagues, industry experts, partners and our professional colleagues from all over Europe. The conference is the perfect forum to establish and maintain contacts, to share knowledge about best practices and gain deeper business insights. All this will help us to drive forward innovation and added value in our ecosystem,“ commented Dr. Claire Penny, Business Development Executive of IBM. The exhibition accompanying the EFMC will feature presentations by various companies from the FM sector including AB Facility, ARCHIBUS, Bilfinger HSG International Facility Management, CFI, IKA DATA, Kaba Gallenschütz, MainManager, Manhattan Software, McFelder, MCS, Planon, Procos and TOPdesk. TriGranit and GC System as well as more than 15 media partners from numerous European countries will also be supporting the event which is being organised by Euroforum and Informa Exhibitions.

German version as PDF-Download

Czech version as PDF-download

Contact:
Julia Batzing
Senior Press Officer
Informa Exhibitions, a division of Euroforum Deutschland SE
Prinzenallee 3
40549 Düsseldorf
Telephone: +49 (0)2 11/ 96 86 – 33 81
Fax: +49 (0)2 11/ 96 86 – 43 81
Email
www.euroforum.com

Q: Facility management is a profession that incorporates multiple disciplines to ensure functionality of the built environment. How does TGM see FM’s opportunity and responsibility in integrating people, place, process, and technology?

A: Facility Management (FM) has become an important industry profession, which is responsible for approximately 5% of GDP in most developed countries. In TGM Facility Management we assist our asset managers and landlords by operating their assets in a cost-efficient manner aiming to provide optimum business conditions for tenants. Our customer centric passion drives our vision to become the quality choice of FM service provider in our selected target markets for retail, office and leisure asset categories.

Q: One of the most difficult tasks is providing clients with something unique solution; no other FM companies have on their service palette. How does TGM differentiate its services from other players? What’s your specialty?

A: For each asset with under TGM mandate the site-level FM-team reporting always to the Site Manager and receiving functional support and control from the central FM units. The basic site-level operational processes are defined in the TGM operational handbook (defined for retail/office assets) aligned with the centrally driven reporting and support processes. Managing their performance delivery using an FM Business Balance Scorecard our site based FM teams are very attentive and are empowered to translate and implement customer requests into cost-efficient solutions.

Q: You’ve indicated the ultimate role of the site-level FM-team. What is the relationship between the HQs and the site-team like? What can the central organization add to this process?

A: TGM FM has also a central organization supporting the assets under management with a best-in- class FM Competence Center, embedding our business excellence in service processes, sophisticated tools and know-how. With this international but centralized approach we can leverage regionally the locally available knowledge through teamwork and best practice sharing, cost and process benchmarks across sites under management. This way our landlords and tenants will benefit from our full portfolio experience going beyond the exceptionally good capabilities of any individual site team we run. TGM’s own regional FM platform creating a powerful network of highly experienced FM professionals is capitalizing on our central FM knowledge database and a structured information exchange enabling us to offer unique service quality and FM expertise to our customers.

Q: I do understand that TGM has built up an excellent structure to facilitate the different onsite requirements. Who and how can enjoy all the benefits TGM has to offer?

A: Our capabilities, passion and drive for business excellence are at the service of our landlords / asset managers at any stage of their project / asset. We offer full on-site FM service for operating assets and a range of add-on services from our competence centre. We are also eager to create value for our customers with assets yet under construction or in design stage offering the services design review, construction supervision, tendering supervision and FM setup /pre-opening.

Q: Outsourcing and cost reduction have been and still are important trends within FM but in recent years they have been combined with a new trend for adding value to corporations and increasingly also to society at large. Issues such as sustainability and corporate social responsibility become a key concern for both public and private corporations. Are you ready and able to meet these calls?

A: TGM FM is responding to this challenge by defining its Green Program with a bold initiative and ambitious targets. We want to improve and monitor progress on the environmental performance of existing buildings managed by us. We want to achieve this by using a green assessment methodology that enables cost-efficient self-assessments with annual progress measurement and benchmarking, and best practice sharing within our managed portfolio of properties. Needless to say that recognition of achievement of international green standards and linking to and compatibility with existing certificates (BREEAM, LEED, HQE) is also important for us. This is why we have used already in 2012 the Green Alliance rating in our portfolio and currently initiating BREEAM In-use assessments.

• IBM TRIRIGA is the leading web-based, Integrated Workplace Management Solution (IWMS).
• Our solution consists of a fully interoperable set of applications on a single data repository that provide end-to-end, enterprise class Workplace Performance Management.
• The solution is fully web-based, role-driven, workflow-enabled, and highly configurable to meet your specific requirements.
• IBM is ranked by leading industry analysts as the number one vendor for providing the most comprehensive IWMS available

In today’s dynamic business environment, forward-thinking organizations must gain and retain strategic advantage and operational efficiency. To do so, they need adaptable business processes, combined with agile technology platforms allowing them to adapt to rapidly changing business needs. To achieve this agility, solutions require extensible application features, adaptable business logic, full interoperability with the required scale to react quickly as demands change. The underlying application technology, its architecture, the ability to integrate with other critical business systems and overall adaptability are crucial to efficient performance, successful deployment and rapid user adoption.

IBM TRIRIGA is the only solution to feature technology that provides Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) across the complete real estate life cycle. IBM understands that you are committed to transforming your Real Estate service delivery and to reducing overall costs as you make this transformation. TRIRIGA contains Workplace Performance Management (WPMTM) which uniquely integrates enterprise performance management with TRIRIGA’s operational IWMS applications so that actual performance, measured via industry benchmarks, competitive analysis and balanced scorecards, can be assessed against targets. This will assist you in:

• Delivering services faster, better, and more efficiently, to meet leading industry practices.
• Identifying substantive, qualified opportunities to reduce operating costs
• Providing enterprise-wide visibility of the entire portfolio of services.

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