FREEMARKETS, INC. (now ARIBA)
Corporate Headquarters
Pittsburgh PA

Occupying the top 20 floors of a 30-story downtown office building, FreeMarkets, Inc. is a worldwide on-line reverse auction service providing corporate and government purchasing clients instant access to suppliers. Mission-critical to this far-reaching business model is that its corporate headquarters, training facilities (FreeMarkets University), Network and Security Operations Centers, extensive call and marketing center, and a state-of-the-art executive Market Operations Center be headquartered in a single high-rise facility, and have virtually unlimited, instantaneous access to data on a 24/7 basis.

Complex issues such as video compression standards, access to appropriate bandwidth for connectivity, satellite connectivity, duplicity of power and data for uninterrupted transmission and reception, acoustics, lighting and functional user interfaces set the parameters in the design of this high performance executive communications environment. Of vital importance to FreeMarkets, Inc. was that its investment in multimedia technology would be capable of withstanding technological change and allow for future growth.

This project set the standard for fast-track. Constructed at the peak of the expansion boom of the 1990’s, the project was continually building out literally days ahead of occupancy, floor-by-floor.

The scope of the project included designing program goals and objectives, conceptual systems and facilities solutions, budgets, and implementation time lines for each space. In addition, The Sextant Group delivered acoustics (including office sound masking), technical power, and mechanical systems recommendations, plus complete specifications, cost estimates and detailed systems engineering documents for a myriad of environments in additional sites across the country, Europe and Asia in record time.