SALTO Systems has been selected to provide a smart access control solution for Venture X, a modern workspace community located in Chiswick Park, West London. This business hub, with great transport links into Central London and Heathrow Airport is home to some of the world’s leading companies working in the oil and gas, media, entertainment, technology, food and drink, and health and beauty markets.
It comprises 1.8m sq/ft of award winning accommodation, arranged as a necklace of 12 office buildings. Each building faces the Park’s ‘inner garden’ with a featured two-tier lake, waterfall, decked boardwalk, pathways, events space and landscaping. Chiswick Park also houses over 45,000 sq/ft of retail including the on-site Virgin Active gym, restaurants, convenience stores and an ever-changing array of pop-up traders and street-food vendors.
Part of the global Venture X United Franchise Group, Venture X provides a brand new inspiring, diverse, and collaborative working environment that is so much more than just shared office space. Housed in a cutting-edge sustainable building development, which includes solar fins, it offers a place where individuals and businesses can lease hot desks, private desks or private offices.
Hot desks offer 24/7 access to common working areas (hubs) including phone booths and high-speed Wi-Fi. Private desks add a Cat 6 Ethernet port, meeting and boardroom access, a business address with incoming mail handling, lockable office space and a private locker. Private offices top the package by proving all the previous offerings but in a fully furnished office space including SALTO access control.
With some 30 internal office and meeting room doors to secure, Venture X was looking for a technologically modern locking solution that would satisfy the needs of both the business and its customers. Key requirements were the ability to grant access rights instantly for new customers and revoke them in real-time for former customers. No hassle, costs or security issues with mechanical keys were wanted. They needed an audit-trail overview of who accessed which door at which time. Flexibility allocating office space, meeting rooms etc on a day to day basis as required. Easy meeting and conference room access, and finally, easy, wire-free installation without software installation and IT configuration.
To meet these needs, SALTO’s KS ‘Keys as a Service’ cloud-based locking solution was recommended. This provides a flexible access control management system that requires no software installation or the added expense of a fully-wired electronic product. All that is needed is an online device with an Internet connection. Providing end users with cloud-based SALTO KS Keys as a Service reduces cost and almost eliminates the need for maintenance. Highly secure, thanks to its 2-factor-authentication and 128bit AES encryption; it provides flexibility, scalability, reliability, and the ability to manage access control from any Internet platform.
Venture X Director, Andrew Ross, said: “When you’re providing a working and meeting environment for entrepreneurs, and business people and large corporates, many of whom will be involved with technology businesses, security, efficiency and design were all essential aspects of the brief when we selected our preferred access control solution.
“One of our key requirements was a product that offered both a card and mobile app solution that would enable us and our members to remotely open doors, i.e. for customers, tradespersons or postal deliveries to gain access for example without the need for a staff member to be physically present in the building.
“Another feature we wanted was office mode, so instead of having to present an access card or smart phone app to a door every time someone used it, the door would function just like a normal door during pre-set times but auto lock when required. The SALTO KS we’ve now installed meets those requirements and gives us comprehensive 24/7 access control that covers our entire property. We are looking forward to utilising SALTO KS across the new Venture X locations that are in development for 2020 and 2021.”
