One Workplace, the largest office furniture dealer in the Bay Area with 2018 revenues of over $400 million, today announced the launch of Vantis, an interior commercial facilities construction company specializing in off-site construction of custom interiors.
With the new venture, which will operate as a separate company, One Workplace is doubling down on its investment in commercial interior spaces, and leveraging advancements in technology and off-site construction to serve a regional market estimated at $6 billion annually. Vantis also is a response to California’s high conventional construction costs and a labor shortage affecting the industry, which has challenged general contractors in particular.
“One Workplace has long provided space planning, design and construction services to create spaces that inspire people and transform organizations,” says Mark Baker, COO of One Workplace. “But the opportunity for commercial interior construction services as a complement and as a niche business is so large and compelling that it makes sense for Vantis to be a separate company in order to become a leader in the market. We are excited to see Vantis launch today.”
Ryan Ware, a construction industry veteran who joined One Workplace in 2017 as vice president of construction, will lead Vantis as the company moves through this rapid growth stage. Ware calls interior building construction “a highly specialized service that’s becoming more specialized every day. Vantis is dedicated to serving general contractors and end-users who can benefit from a one-stop shop for interior construction. We look forward to serving the market with our evolved approach.”
$33 Million of Business Out of the Gate
Vantis begins operation with about $33 million of business that has been assigned by One Workplace. A team of 27 members supports Vantis customers with architecture, design, engineering, construction and account services. The company’s initial focus is Northern California, with potential future expansion into other markets.
A design-build and design-assist construction company, Vantis specializes in custom interiors for healthcare, office, educational, and other high-density facilities. These spaces require a high level of preconstruction planning to ensure the construction solutions meet users’ needs and are highly flexible to meeting their evolving needs.
Vantis utilizes off-site construction, versus conventional onsite construction, to produce the improvements.
“Off-site construction as part of a custom design-build service process allows Vantis to deliver a highly functional facility with increased efficiency,” Ware says. “We can save GCs headaches and assure construction costs, while at the same time delivering custom solutions optimized for the end user.
“In the old days, off-site construction really meant pre-fab construction. With today’s technology and manufacturing process, materials are fabricated on a custom basis. It’s one size fits one — the end user — versus one size fits all.”
Hallmarks of the Vantis Approach to Interior Building Construction
The Vantis approach to interior building construction produces a custom result like conventional onsite construction, but with a host of other benefits that are different from conventional construction.
· Fast and Efficient: Vantis integrates multiple trades in-house to be a one-stop shop for custom designed, off-site constructed facility interiors. Off-site production means improvements can be constructed twice as fast as conventional construction.
· Customized: Vantis space planners and interior architects start with a blank page to design custom solutions, and use 3-D visualization to “fly” users through the space to demonstrate how improvements will look and function. Vantis interior construction solutions support all manner of custom millwork, surfaces, equipment and technologies.
· Optimized: Build-outs designed and produced by Vantis integrate technology and electrical into walls, dividers and other components so they provide higher performance than conventional construction. In addition, the solutions offer more flexibility on Day 2 for space occupants to change fits and finishes and reconfigure spaces.
· Less disruptive: Since components are fabricated off-site and quickly installed on-site, there’s less noise, downtime and productivity loss by space users.
· More cost certainty: The Vantis process is front-loaded to focus on planning and design. Because preconstruction planning is so exacting, construction costs can be estimated more precisely and met with more certainty. In other words, we engineer value up front, rather than value-engineer on the back-end, to keep costs reasonable going in and ensure delivery on budget.
· Cleaner and greener: Vantis’ off-site construction approach generates less waste, less debris and fewer off-gases, with labor efficiently utilized and more materials recycled. Vantis-constructed interiors can facilitate LEED certification of buildings.