Blending the needs of your business, your tenants and your clients with workable affordable solutions has always been a challenge. In this issue we take a look at some new tools that can assist real estate companies in managing properties in the field, providing tenants with state of the art digital information and entertainment and more, while lowering costs.

Putting It All Together
Increasing value for office tenants was the driving force that sparked 13 commercial real estate companies to form the Office Technology Consortium. United, these firms will pull from their collective knowledge of the industry and technology to create an extensive on-line Landlord Procurement Exchange and an on-line Leasing Exchange.

"The Office Technology Consortium grew from a shared determination to increase value for both customers and shareholders," said Ray Weeks, vice chairman of Duke-Weeks Realty Corporation and chairman of the Office Technology Consortium. "The consortium will promote customer service standards based on best practices.

Input will be solicited from all interested industry players. Although adherence to these best practices will be entirely voluntary, we believe that our shared commitment to customer service will enhance overall performance in the commercial property sector." The Landlord Procurement Exchange is designed to lower landlord and tenant operating costs and increase rental value while the Leasing Exchange will enable customers to make faster, as well as more informed decisions regarding leasing of office space.

"The procurement exchange will allow members to collectively lower operating costs for both landlords and tenants. It also provides suppliers more efficient access to property owners with a combined portfolio of over 400 million square feet of office property space," said Weeks, adding that "more and more tenants are going to want a "24-7" environment for leasing and expect an online option. This consortium will fill that want and need."

Brandywine-2-Tenants
Commerce is moving faster for Brandywine Realty Trust tenants these days through the REITs e-Tenants.com website, a full-service tenant amenity program.

"The idea behind e-Tenants.com was straightforward," said Gerry Sweeney, Brandywine's president and CEO. "The idea was to pull together a platform that addressed three major issues that are on the minds of commercial real estate owners."

Those issues are business-to-business services, business-to-consumers conveniences such as discounted movie tickets, and facilities management. By using e-Tenants, employers will be able to purchase furniture, phone systems and more online. Their employees will be able to research the neighborhood for drycleaners, restaurants and more. Through an alliance with VIPdesk.com's concierge service, e-Tenant users will be treated to a personal assistant with e-mail "reminders" for important dates, birthdays and the like as well as receive continuous feeds of weather, traffic, news and stock quote. And by using the Tenant Service Request program, tenants can order maintenance repairs and search for additional office space within the Brandywine portfolio.

"We want to create an environment where tenants want to stay in a Brandywine building because they get better service," said Sweeney. "We think e- Tenants.com provides us with the ability to deliver on that."

Mobile Management
Redwood City, CA, firm Corrigo Inc.'s Mobile Service Management product keeps field staff connected to management without wires.

"What we provide is a complete solution for the maintenance and customer service functions of real estate," said Rick Michaux, president. "It's different than other maintenance type systems in that it's aiming not to be a back office tool, but to support operations by helping staff to interact with customers through a web site and a phone number that we provide."

Corrigo Inc. designs custom management solutions for its customers, of which wireless communication complete with telephones, internet browsers, web sites, and optional walkie-talkies and pagers play a key role in efficient property upkeep and supplier and vendor management.

"These are the tools you need out in the field so that maintenance technicians don't have to come back to the office to receive service requests," said Michaux.

For instance, if a tenant needs to order maintenance, he would enter the request via management's web site. The maintenance worker would access the website using his wireless telephone where he would get the work order, coordinate vendors, purchase materials and so on. Management can also access the web site to track maintenance repair. Tenants are also automatically surveyed via e-mail after the work is finished so that the company can gauge customer satisfaction. "If the tenant responds with a negative survey, we ping the property manager," noted Michaux.

Tracking vendor's products performance is another Corrigo service real estate owners can use to analyze life cycle costs. For instance, one property manager switched to washers that cost 30 percent less than the models they were previously using, but they had to be replaced in half the time, which cost the company more in materials and labor, according to Michaux.

"We associate all maintenance work done with all the procurement activities so that we can tell people about life cycle costs," he said. "At the end of the day we want [property owners and managers] to have everything they need without thinking too much about it."

Multi-family REITs BRE Properties and Gables are now piloting Mobile Service Management and Corrigo expects to move into the office market later in the year.

My Coach, and More…
With over $750 billion spent each year, construction is one of the largest industries nationwide. Project teams on those sites might find communication easier with Collaborative Structures Inc.'s new FirstLine Plus, a web-based project communications application that includes training, "my coach" click support, custom reporting and partnering services for project partnering training.

"Much of what we do is make sure we are not serving up technology for its own sake," said David Paolella, director of business development of the Boston, MA, firm. "We're looking for enabling technology that will help people get their work done today. It's got to be useful regardless of what platform someone is working on. It has to be able to give information needed about project without having a lot of IT support."

In addition to service/training support already provided to FirstLine users, these new features are focused on customer service. On-line training is provided to users via the Internet, "My coach" click support will instantly contact a project application specialist who will contact the customer at a designated time and number. During the FirstLine planning session, the core team will decide which customized reports are required to efficiently run the job, and an interactive workshop will provide participants with hands-on experience in several "real-world" construction partnering situations.

"From feasibility studies to schematic design phase to the bid phase, any time in the process is a good time to begin using FirstLine and we have experience at pulling projects together in any phase," said Paolella.

The Resident Club
Over 40 owners of apartment buildings have joined The Resident Club, a creator of private-labeled turnkey web community and e-commerce programs.

"We develop websites for MDUs (multiple dwelling units) so they can have a presence on the Internet for their residents," explained Mary Browning, director marketing and communication of the Austin, TX, firm. "It's an easy tool that will generate ancillary revenue streams."

Digital Network
Telephone, fax, two-way, high-speed Internet access, satellite, and digital television are services that Skyway Partners Inc. is providing to multi-family units and small and medium sized businesses.

"That differentiates Skyway from the rest of the gang," said Christopher Catranis, CEO of the Hauppauge, NY, firm. "We do all these services and put them on one bill. To my knowledge, at this point, there's no competitor that does all of these digitally, and puts it on one bill."

Skyway offers owners an opportunity to recapture telecommunication fees by sharing revenues and fees generated from Skyway's digital network that is custom designed for the property.

"We'll do an analysis of the property and then we do a competition study so we can provide better services for less money than the local competitors," said Catranis. "We also have somebody who can build and maintain our infrastructure for us."

After Skyway completes its analysis it will enter into a partnership with the owner/landlord where they sign a lease for the equipment. However, Skyway pays the lease with the proceeds it collects from the property. Profits are split 51 percent for the landlord and 49 percent for Skyway.