Is your building built for business? Landlords need to focus on amenities also

In today's competitive commercial real estate market, building landlords and managers are continually looking for ways to differentiate their buildings from other commercial buildings. Attracting and retaining tenants depends not only on factors such as location and price, but on the amenities that the landlord offers to help tenants maximize the productivity and efficiency. Landlords need to ensure that their buildings are truly "built for the business." For many landlords and managers, the ability to offer access to a state-of-the-art high-speed, high-capacity fiber optic network is proving to be what elevates their buildings above others. It is no surprise that robust broadband telecommunications access is on many tenants' must-have lists. As such, landlords and developers are increasingly eager to offer this capability to their current and prospective tenants, realizing that this is a good investment now and for the future. The advantages it provides to tenants, coupled with the ability to charge a premium for the service, make it a win-win for the landlord and building manager. While there are several types of broadband solutions that exist today, one stands above the rest in regards to reliability, capacity, security and cost-effectiveness: Carrier-class Ethernet technology powered by a fully fiber optic network. What is Carrier Ethernet? Carrier-class Ethernet is a Wide or Metropolitan Area Network (WAN or MAN), based on Ethernet technology, which is used to simply and effectively link multiple locations, run bandwidth-intensive applications and deliver IP communications over a single, converged network. Carrier Ethernet solutions provide a range of benefits over existing metro network technologies such as frame relay or ATM, including simplicity, increased capacity, greater flexibility and scalability, easier application access, better business continuity and lower cost. Benefits to Tenants As more and more companies require high-capacity Internet connectivity as well as multipoint and point to point connections, Carrier Ethernet is quickly emerging as one of the most reliable, cost-efficient communications technologies for mid and large sized businesses. According to the Insight Research Corporation, the U.S. Ethernet services market is expected to grow to more than $5 billion in 2012. Why is demand for Metro Ethernet growing so rapidly? Fiber-based Carrier Ethernet can provide businesses with simple, cost effective data, Internet and voice solutions that can bolster operations and reduce costs. Additionally, Carrier Ethernet is extremely reliable, and designed to deliver the quality of service the most demanding businesses require.  Benefits to Landlords Carrier Ethernet networks provide increased building value and peace of mind to landlords by enabling them to provide innovation, simplicity and predictability to their tenants' business network solutions and telecommunications. Landlords with access to a Carrier-class Ethernet network can get a competitive edge by equipping their building with this service. Fiber connectivity will future-proof their building's network - and their tenants' - while providing the most reliable, highest capacity broadband service available. If your building already has fiber, you may want to consider a second provider, as more and more businesses are requiring diversity in their networks. Choosing a Carrier Ethernet Partner The New York Metropolitan Carrier Ethernet market has several carriers that sell Ethernet point-to-point, access and multipoint services. Therefore it is important for landlords and building managers to partner with service providers that have extensive commercial market experience, comply with industry standards and have a fiber-rich network with a strong geographic footprint. Optimum Lightpath is one such provider. We have an advanced fiber-to-the-business-premises network extending more than 2,750 route miles throughout the New York area with more than 2,800 fiber lit buildings. We work with several real estate firms who have found it a tremendous benefit, and a key differentiator, to be able to offer high speed fiber connectivity to their clients. One of these is Mack-Cali, a leading real estate investment trust (REIT), with a total market capitalization of over $5 billion. The company owns and manages almost 34 million square feet of class A office and office/flex properties in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions. Mack-Cali offers Optimum Lightpath's services in many of the buildings that it manages in Westchester County and New Jersey. "In today's day and age, high speed bandwidth and diversity are major factors when companies choose a location to ultimately locate their businesses," said Jeffrey Warner, vice president of leasing, Mack-Cali Realty Corporation. "Mack-Cali has made an effort over the last 10 years to work with telecommunications companies to bring the latest in fiber optic and telecommunications technology to our buildings. Being able to offer Optimum Lightpath's all-fiber network to our building tenants allows us to accomplish this objective." Today's sophisticated tenants are demanding cutting-edge telecommunications amenities that enable them to deploy bandwidth-hungry applications and access more information faster than their competitors. A fiber-optic backbone will ensure that landlords and building managers can meet these now and into the future. Is your building built for business? If not, you may be losing out to your competition. David Strauss is the vice president of marketing for Optimum Lightpath, Jericho, N.Y.