PWC holds breakfast forum on facility management

Real Estate Weekly, August 22, 2001

According to Lenore Janis, president of Professional Women in Construction, "the facility manager plays a crucial role. He or she must be able to act and react and effectuate the changes needed at a moments' notice." On July 18, PWC presented a breakfast forum devoted to "Facility Management -- 2001 and Beyond." The forum featured a panel of speakers, including John Martens, vice president and senior technical manager of Merrill Lynch, Anthony Cammarata, Jr., vice president of corporate facilities for Goldman, Sachs & Co., John Vazquez, senior vice president and director of global facilities services for J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., and Leslie Nydick, senior director of corporate real estate for Winstar Communications.

According to Martens, the focus at Merrill Lynch has changed recently to management of non-revenue producing areas with massive standardization and cost reductions. "Construction projects that we planned nine months age are currently on hold," he said. "Still, we continue to support the growth of our core business, which entails such steps as expanding our data center and conducting technology upgrades."

Cammarata, who is in charge of planning, leasing, design, and construction for almost six million SF of space, noted that "as market conditions worsen and real estate and construction costs increase, when we lease, design, and rebuild space it's important to make all affected divisions part of the decision-making and workplace design process." Vazquez' mission right now is to "think globally, act locally."

According to Vazquez, the recent merger with Morgan Guaranty Trusts has created "merger synergies."

"We're on a mission to consolidate 47 cities around the world," he said. "We had six week to strategize the consolidation of 45 million square feet of space in our global portfolio and we're actively working on 20 million that number. We are exiting 6 million square feet and restacking another 6 million. 7 million square feet are being built new or reconstructed."