Hoffman La Roche’s Vietnamese Headquarters
When global pharmaceuticals company Hoffman La Roche made the decision to design their new head office in Vietnam, they chose an excellent perch within the iconic Bitexco Financial Tower overlooking Ho Chi Minh City. Award-winning design firm, DWP, was brought in to complete the project, which was lead by Lucas Torresi and James Campbell.
In terms of raw details, the space includes a fairly standard set of features: a reception, 5 meeting rooms, a town hall meeting room for 130 people, an open office area for about 65 people, hot desk areas, a boardroom, 10 private offices, pantry, library, IT rooms, filing and storage space.
But when put in context, the space shines for its pushing Vietnamese office design forward. Torresi noted the following with regard to the local office design landscape – and how this project fits in:
“This office represents the best that Vietnam market has to offer today in terms of workplace design, not only for the variety of their facilites but also for the quality of finishes and materials. Slowly companies are starting to understand the importance of the environment where they work in, and how it can support (or not) their operations.”
Hotdesking, a topic covered regularly here, is an important feature of the office – though not the only workspace option:
“La Roche has, as part of their group of employees, some of them who work most of the time outside of the office and only come in for an hour or so a day, so we designed an area for them, where they can still ‘own’ a desk, but in a more flexible environment, and without other facilites as fixed IT systems, storage, etc as they don’t need it.
There is also an area for visitors from other La Roche offices or partners who can ‘plug in’ into the office system, and is located to have access to the nearby library and pantry.”
As far as furnishings are concerned, a local company, TAV, was used for the most heavily while seating was provisioned by Steelcase.
