French Focus – Corporate Responsibility and Commercial Real Estate

Technology and innovation is causing global business transformation. The impact continues to be felt by the commercial real estate industry and the markets and ecosystems in which we operate. The key themes of trust and responsibility spans investors, occupiers, developers and operators. So, how are businesses responding in France?

Companies in France are required to communicate, in a transparent fashion, about their social and environmental policy. Since legal inception in 2012 this has had a number of positive consequences for the property industry:

Real estate functions at companies must now incorporate, and report on, Corporate Responsibility performance related commitments and indicators

As a result, real estate professions spanning investors, developers, advisers, and asset, property, and facility managers must plan accordingly

Given this backdrop, CBRE has produced a report called ‘We All Have a Responsibility in Real Estate‘ which focuses attention on how real estate is getting ready to respond to new challenges.  The report addresses three core areas:

• How to respond to environmental and energy concerns including climate change and greenhouse gases, health and quality of life, and supply chain energy transition
• How companies can improve stakeholder and community engagement through more ambitious corporate responsibility strategies and partnerships
• Utilising real-time digital information via energy performance systems to effect change
• Some key themes in the report, specifically how to better enmesh property life cycle issues, include:
• Socially Responsible Investment (SRI)

SRI has experienced strong growth in the past few years. There is no standard definition of SRI for real estate, nevertheless, we know that green buildings outperform in terms of overall return: This is the famous “green value“.

Technical and digital innovations for developers and operators
For the last two years, authorities in France have made a paradigm shift. New government requirements are not only about conventional energy consumption, but focus on actual global consumption too. Typically, this means mandatory reporting requirements for all companies such as green leases, energy audits about all activities (not just building energy consumption), and energy-efficient renovation of commercial property stock.

In addition to such approaches, the development of digital technologies is creating change for the industry. For example, BIM (building information modeling), the impact of big data on property management, and the use of software platforms to control, and report on, the entire building life cycle.

Health, comfort and wellness for new workplaces
With a potential financial gain that is equivalent to the cost of rent, the comfort, health and wellbeing of occupiers stands out. This is a crucial factor when it comes to building design and office layout.

In conclusion, a revolution is under way. Property owners rent hardware today. In the future, they’ll need to provide an integrated services solution that includes both hardware and software. In 2030, property owners will no longer calculate their building value solely based on rent. The calculation will also depend on the revenue of all the services provided. This is why integrating sustainable business practices across the supply chain is business critical.