Before
you even leave the parking structure, you realize that the new building
is designed to be a showpiece as much as a work-a-day office building.
The lawns (all watered with recycled water) provide a welcome relief
from the mostly asphalt surroundings of the industrial section of North
San Jose where the facility is located.
The very angular outside
of the structure also belies the flowing curves found inside the new 1.1
million square-foot, LEED-certified structure.
The
large interior courtyard is not only gorgeous, but is deliberately
designed to improve collaboration. Looking out or across from one of the
open-air garden floors, employees are more likely to see others that
they might not otherwise run into. Architects NBBJ ran simulations of
various building designs using avatars, to come up with one that would
maximize employee interactions — working to deliver on one of Samsung’s
core values of collaboration.
I share their enthusiasm for the
idea, but with mid-day light creating dark shadows, I’m not sure how
many employees will recognize each other from across the courtyard.
The
building features stunning views from nearly every floor. At ten
stories, it dwarfs all the other nearby structures, giving it an
unbroken line of sight to the mountains on both sides of Silicon Valley.
Samsung is right that this is definitely a plus in terms of quality of
work environment, compared with many of the “tilt-up” structures that
populate most of Silicon Valley.
The building is currently home to about 700 Samsung employees, but can accommodate as many as 2,000.
As
befits a modern workplace, the building has a workout facility with
just about every exercise machine imaginable. The view can’t be beat
either, as the entire facility is arranged around the outside of one of
the open floors.
Not
everyone loves open floor plans, but they have become much more popular
(again) in high-tech. There is no question they facilitate
collaboration compared with walled offices. Of course, companies like
them because they are much more flexible. One other advantage is that
everyone gets great views, since they aren’t cut off by walls.
Samsung
has also provided some two-story open areas like the one pictured, with
internal staircases. That too is designed to aid in casual
collaboration, as are the many lounge and work areas scattered
throughout the building. I was disappointed to see that the work areas
had only traditional-sized whiteboards. One innovation I’ve seen and
used very effectively is whiteboard walls.
No
tech tour would be complete without a lab visit. Here we got to see
Samsung’s Enterprise Test lab –where storage devices are run in a
variety of vendor systems before release — along with a preview of its 16TB SSD and
the test system with their new 1 million IOPS solid-state storage
device. Notice that even the test machines get a great view!
One
of the design goals of the new building is to facilitate collaboration
between floors. So, sandwiched between each pair of regular work floors
(on the 5th and 8th floors) is what Samsung calls a garden floor. They
feature actual gardens, and plenty of open walking space on both the
North and South tower sides, as well as crossings between them.
Samsung
hasn’t quite gone all out in embracing the “you can have anything you
want” free-food-and-drink culture of Google and Facebook. Snacks and
sundries are for sale in a small convenience store. Employees do get one
free meal a day in the cafeteria, and the rest are subsidized 50%.
No
longer do high-tech employees have to head off to a bar to play pool or
Foosball. Like many companies, Samsung provides a wide variety of
leisure activities on site. This is particularly important in areas like
North First Street in San Jose, which are definitely not
pedestrian-friendly, and where there aren’t many food or recreation
alternatives close by.
No
more napping under your desk. Samsung has installed “sleep pods” for
those times when you just can’t stay awake while waiting for your
simulation to finish or the sun to come up. Our host didn’t know quite
how they worked, but they are right next to the Foosball tables, so I
hope the glass is really soundproof.
As
you’d expect, there is an extensive set of charging stations for
electric vehicles — helpfully labelled “clean air vehicle.” The facility
is also near San Jose’s Light Rail, which is a good thing, because
traffic at rush hour is pretty terrible around there.
The
highlight of an otherwise run-of-the-mill ribbon cutting ceremony was a
performance by music-and-dance troupe Eclipse. Samsung may be in the
press a lot recently for financial problems, but you wouldn’t have known
it from the new headquarters building or the grand opening celebration.
Clearly the troupe customized their performance, as here in the
concluding scene they have Samsung’s motto projected on the big screen
behind them.
The
architects at NBBJ did an excellent job of combining inward-looking
views that could feature the gardens, lawns, and trees that Samsung has
added to the site with external vistas off into the mountains. Since the
building itself is surrounded mostly by not very attractive industrial
structures, this was an especially-challenging task. I do wonder how the
feel of the building will change if other corporations start putting up
equally-tall buildings nearby.
This view is back from one of the garden floors to the cafeteria building and parking structure.
12/11/2015
Here’s a look inside Samsung’s new US semiconductor HQ [PHOTOS]
When Samsung came to Silicon
Valley in 1983, it was in a nondescript, two-story, brown building. This
week, on the same site, it unveiled a massive new state-of-the-art,
10-story US headquarters for its Device Solutions businesses (memory,
storage systems, displays, and semiconductors). As part of its grand
opening, we got to tour the facility, speak with the architects about
the project, and take plenty of photos to share with you.
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