CBRE Marina Bay Financial Centre, Singapore

• Case Studies

AV professionals know their way around a corporate deployment. Meeting spaces need to work efficiently with sessions starting promptly and without user intervention. Town halls need to engage patrons and link with wider signage systems and even remote locations. Productivity is the name of the game and users need to be provided the tools and spaces that empower them to do more.

But is the current status quo when it comes to workplaces the extent of technology’s capabilities?

The deployment at CBRE Marina Bay Financial Centre, Singapore, which won CBRE and integrator Esco the Corporate Category Project Award at the 2025 Inavate APAC Awards, answers this question with a resounding no. As a party that advises its clients on how to effectively conceptualise and create workspaces, CBRE was laser focused on showing what can be achieved when technology is given a core remit to shape workspaces. When it came to creating its own flagship office at Marina Bay Financial Centre (MBFC), Singapore, CBRE decided it was time to push the boundaries.

What followed was an inventive, innovative, and experimental approach to technology considering not only productivity outcomes but also ESG goals.

We start the exploration of the technology deployment at CBRE MBFC with the arrival experience. CBRE’s considered approach is evident from the start as all the five senses are engaged as soon as a visitor steps into the facility. Simon Long, CBRE’s senior director of technology consulting details: “Our arrival is focused around your sight, sound and smell so we have a custom fragrance thanks to Liyah Aura [who also provided the fragrances for Jewel and Changi Airport] that’s connected to our HVAC. Additionally, we are playing with the lighting and sounds so the music and video content all fit into a specific aesthetic that we are aiming for. The idea was that the arrival experience should both physically and emotionally transition the visitor from being outside to now being in the CBRE MBFC office.”

An Absen 1.5mm videowall, 8.5m long by 1.8m wide runs across the ceiling and wall, powered by Novastar processors and running Resolume, greets visitors with visuals. What is interesting is the fact that the videowall is in ‘portrait mode’. Long details: “There is now more portrait content in the world than there is landscape. This is a trend that switched about 18 months ago, and the reasons for this are obvious. We’re using our phones to record content more and more and social media, like TikTok, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels were all designed for short-form content shot in portrait. We’re seeing a requirement from a lot of our clients to have more portrait displays for content, and we also wanted to incorporate that into our displays.”

Furthermore, the videowall has been supplemented with strategically placed portrait displays. These have been placed to enhance the aesthetics of the arrival space by obfuscating columns and also enabling a ‘see through’ operation mode where it displays visuals from the adjoining areas.

Deployment of the videowall was complicated by geopolitical elements. Long sheds light: “One of the things that slowed down construction of this space were the ‘tariffs’. China reciprocally instituted a policy where a permit was required to import anything that included rare earth materials which LED tiles do. So, the time for procuring these tiles and replacement panels jumped up to 17 weeks in some cases.” When it comes to sound, the arrival experience zone and the entire CBRE MBFC office is overlaid with Moodsonic adaptive audio, guided by acoustic sensors that modulate biophilic background sound in real time and provide live data. The facility is divided in 14 zones and granular control of the audio experience in these zones is possible.

What exactly is biophilic audio? Long answers: “Biophilic audio content is the sound of nature. It connects with users emotionally. In addition, we have focused on harmonic audio content here which has certain frequencies incorporated that help users perform tasks. So, when users want to do focused work, pairing soundscapes that have certain harmonic frequencies helps them to focus, or helps them to relax, or helps them to engage. With Moodsonic and the biophilic audio outcomes it enables we have the ability to create audio experiences for our zones that help users do what they are aiming to do.”

Long delves further into why the adaptive approach to audio was implemented: “Most offices that we work in just play generic background sounds like pink noise and we even have pink noise at our CBRE PLQ facility. Pink noise is great at sound masking, but it is just perceived as a ‘noise’ as there is no real variability. With biophilic and harmonic content we can have the audio experience contribute more than just on a functional level.”

A total of 116 BlueSound BCS300 PoE pendant speakers with Pen-1 kits, together with 14 BlueSound Hubs, are used for audio output across the facility.

Having PoE speakers was essential, and Long elaborates: “From a real-estate perspective, the flexibility is important. If a client wants to reconfigure their office or wants to make a new working zone, in the past we could have never done that easily with fixed speaker cabling. But now, if we want to reconfigure a space we can do so with a few clicks. The 14 audio zones we have now can just change shape, size, and the number of speakers they include. We now have complete flexibility in our audio, from a single speaker to entire office.”

Fifteen Moodsonic sensors have also been installed across the entire facility. This provides CBRE insight into noise levels and Long explains the benefits: “If a focus room is being used, and I see the noise levels come up to around 48 decibels and above, I know that the user is on a call. I don’t need to hear the call or investigate further into what kind of work is being done in the room. If the room is in use, and I see the noise level is in the low 40s or 30s, then the user in there is doing focused work. Why is this important from a real estate perspective? Well, if I’m seeing that all my one and two-person focus rooms are being used for video calls, we know we don’t have enough video rooms for everybody. By understanding the noise and the space usage, we know what type of work people are doing and what type of spaces they need to do this work.”

He continues: “From an AV perspective, this data is invaluable. We can build spaces and say we’ve got 42 decibels of noise blocking at this door or partition, but we only benchmark that when it gets installed. And this can lead to the deployment not meeting expectations if the usage patterns differ from what we approximated during the earlier stage. With this data on noise levels, we can really optimise spaces as a continual process and ensure that real-world performance meets everyone’s expectations.”

Audio distribution is handled via QSC’s Core DSP architecture. The Core 110f and Core 8 Flex processors manage routing, equalisation, and dynamic control, while QSC NL-C4 and AD-C6T-LPZB ceiling speakers deliver full-range coverage across meeting rooms, lounges, and shared spaces. The QSC MP-A80V amplifier ensures clean, efficient power distribution. QSC was specifically chosen for its enterprise-grade DSP, Dante compatibility, and deep integration options with AV and control layers.

When it came to the specific spaces that constitute the CBRE MBFC office, there were concrete aims that guided development. CBRE wanted to achieve one-minute meetings, two-minute town halls, and three-minute podcasts, with an eye on ensuring any user can make use of these spaces.

The most premium of the spaces when it comes to technology is the Town Hall. Once again CBRE’s laser focus on outcomes came into play right from the start. Long elaborates: “All the components of a build project, from architecture, interior design, to technology need to work together if the perfect outcomes are to be achieved. We started conceptualising how the Town Hall would function from the design phase. The walls of the Town Hall are angled, and what that means is that we suddenly have 20% more seating capacity that can see the screen and by curving the interior edges, we are naturally getting better voice projection in the space as well. All this set the space up for success.”

Of note in the Town Hall space is the Samsung P1.5 All-in-One LED 130-in display and the use of ScreenBeam for presentation and content sharing. It was selected to deliver secure, seamless content sharing without having to be connected to the corporate network reducing IT overhead and barriers. Crestron NVX, with Netgear switches, ensures a scalable, an enterprise-ready video backbone.

Bose Column line array speakers are used to provide audio in the Town Hall. Sennheiser microphones and receivers are provided for audio pickup. From the Town Hall we move to another unique space in the shape of the Emerald Suite. Long details: “The Emerald Suite is designed for relaxed conversations, connection, and creative spark. It’s key theme was a play on the ‘hidden bar’ concept and was identified when we spoke to the leaders of different teams; all of them wanted a better space to relax and engage with clients. Brokers will often go to a nearby bar with clients after a successful deal, however they lose privacy for open follow up conversation. So, we wanted to both enhance their experience and optimise our space usage by using a speakeasy theme.”

Another use of the Emerald Suite is podcasting. Long elaborates: “By leveraging the great acoustics of a speakeasy, the space has prosumer podcasting options. We’ve provided Shure MV7+ microphones along with a Rode video caster unit that can be connected to any device via USB-C. This means you can take the output straight to your laptop, and Teams or Zoom just sees it as a single endpoint. Now you can easily, professionally stream an interview or you can just open OBS Studio and hit record. That is our three-minute podcast setup which really showcases how versatile spaces combined with adaptive technology can really deliver and allows the Emerald Suite to really fit the culture here at CBRE.”

CBRE’s approach to meeting spaces that enable communication and collaboration is one that is intensive. Long says: “For every physical seat or primary workstation that we have, we have one seat inside a meeting area or collaboration zone. We have jumped from nine meeting rooms (in the old facility) to 28 meeting rooms.”

Videoconferencing in the meeting spaces is enabled with Poly Studio E70 and E60 cameras as well as Neat Bar and Neat Bar Pro units. What sets the meeting spaces at CBRE MBFC apart is the attention to detail. Helvar lighting control has been employed to ensure that the spaces provide an unparalleled experience. Long details: “One of the things we wanted to do in each of the meeting rooms was to have different light settings. The default setting is ‘present’, which has good light for presenting content on the screen with the lights around 4,200 Kelvin. But this isn’t the best for videoconferencing. So, we have second setting, ‘meet’ which changes the white balance closer to 5,000 Kelvin giving us much better camera image quality. However, this is not necessarily friendly for a quiet, subtle conversation. So, we have the ‘discussion’ setting which brings the lighting down to a far more natural tone. We even have ‘focus’ which makes the lighting much warmer and very soft so you can do focused work. We track profiles used along with the number of presses ‘up’ or ‘down’ on the lights to see if the default settings are right. We’re currently seeing more people press down, so there’s some headroom for energy savings and efficiency.”

The lighting control extends to outside the meeting spaces, with the CBRE MBFC facility having circadian lighting and the potential to do more. Long says: “We can have custom lighting profiles in the office to sync with the F1 or the Marina Bay light show. This is a concept we’re talking about with retail and hospitality clients, called ‘extending experiences’, and it really takes these spaces to a new level even in a corporate setting.” The lighting control also allows CBRE spaces to be kinder and gentler. Long says: “All our rooms are compliant with what we call ‘neurodivergent room’ standards. They have different light settings, and we can dim the lights further. Our initial plan was also to have some areas in the primary working zones with a milder or calmer light tone, but we have this in all the rooms now.”

Data is crucial to how CBRE MBFC operates. Schneider EcoStruxure provides real-time monitoring and control of energy usage, lighting, and power across the office, supporting granular ESG performance analytics, including energy usage linked to AV deployment and usage. DisTech and Schneider IAQ sensors monitor indoor environmental quality and feed data to building operations, helping meet meeting room wellness and sustainability targets.

Together with astute design choices, Long explains how meeting ESG goals impacts the bottom line: “All the electrical circuits for all the meeting rooms are on a separate electrical circuit. This provides us control and allows us to make more sustainable choices. For example, due to this design choice we were able to optimise all the screen and room settings. This resulted in an average 22% reduction in power usage, which means about 200 dollars less in power costs and a 65kg reduction of CO2 per room, per year.”

The data gathered on the whole is always in service of driving better outcomes as evidenced in the boardroom. Long says: “We have sensors in the boardroom, and other rooms as well, that monitor CO2 levels. If you have a large number of people in the space, you’ll often see a jump up to yellow on the CO2 meter. We’ve linked this to our Building Management System (BMS), so if it detects high CO2 levels for more than 10 minutes, it will automatically start circulating more air.”

As with all other spaces, CBRE examined the boardroom space from the ground up and sought to create a space that did more than expected. Long says: “We wanted to solve the ‘boardroom dilemma’ which is that the most expensive room in an organisation gets used the least. We didn’t want that situation. We wanted to create a flexible boardroom environment. So, the rooms divider panels slide out and disappear around the corner, opening up the space and the tables are fully modular and can easily be moved. This means that the space can do much more than simply be a boardroom.”

A forward-thinking project of this scale came with its fair share of challenges. Long details: “While the technology itself was proven, the integration complexity required an insanely high degree of coordination across disciplines. It’s fair to say, far more than we initially planned or expected. We quickly discovered that in such new territory, skills and cross discipline understanding are very limited. But Esco and Valeo Technology both stepped up to deliver.”

Long sheds further light on the complexities: “We were trying to do something different with many aspects of this project. For example, the LED videowall’s aesthetic aspect ratio is a very non-standard 1,500 pixels by 5,000 pixels and posed unexpected challenges in content scaling and controller setup. Lighting integration was another key hurdle. Balancing DMX lighting scenes with daylight sensor-driven adjustments created logic conflicts, particularly around which system held priority during overlapping events. Finally, sensitivity of lighting sensors needed a lot of calibration, even a passing cloud was triggering the lights to turn off until thresholds were refined.”

It is obvious that refinement is a core part of how CBRE operates. Long talks about future improvements based on the learning achieved through the implementation of the CBRE MBFC project: “While our network first AV strategy was successful, the central 42U AV rack in the comms room reached capacity. So unfortunately, some kit had to creep back into one room’s credenza. For future deployments we will plan more generously for infrastructure space. Additionally, we will consider early-stage simulation or prototyping of lighting integration scenarios to better anticipate conflicts between DMX, daylight, and occupancy triggers. Despite this, the inherent adaptability of our system has meant we’ve been able to easily adjust post launch without any major rework.”

With the system live, Long provides insights into what feedback CBRE has received: “Staff feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, especially around video call consistency, room comfort, and the ambient sound environment. We need live usage to highlight areas for optimisation, so the excitement helps users engage with us more enthusiastically when ‘odd’ things happen. Fine-tuning lighting triggers and refining sound zone balancing are now underway with active user input. Our rooms are monitored via Neat Pulse and space via EcoStruxure with clear dashboard overviews for each. Support needs have been minimal thanks to this centralised control and light need for training.”

Moray Armstrong, managing director, CBRE Singapore, shares his thoughts: “This project has transformed our expectations of what modern office technology can deliver. The seamless integration of AV, lighting, and environmental intelligence has created a workplace that feels alive. It’s responsive, human and inspiring. Our people and clients love it.”