Dive Brief:
- Eptura has enhanced the web-based and mobile versions of its unified worktech platform to meet accessibility guidelines while ensuring equal access and use in the workplace.
- Updates to the platform, which connects workplace and physical asset management, include improved color contrast, keyboard navigation, a revamped homepage, alternative text descriptions and design consistency.
- The accessibility enhancements highlight growing tenant demand for social- and governance-oriented ESG efforts from their buildings and technology, as owners and operators increasingly adopt physical building controls, workplace analytics and hybrid remote tools like Eptura’s to improve space utilization.
Dive Insight:
As commercial owners struggle to attract tenants, ESG initiatives are gaining prominence in organizations’ leasing and technology decisions, according to CBRE’s 2023 ESG report. The report surveyed global property professionals on the value of ESG initiatives and found that 62% of occupiers said “improving social mobility, social justice, equality and/or diversity” is “very important.” This focal area ranked higher than those of reducing pollution and increasing the use of sustainable procurement, underscoring the importance of ESG initiatives — aside from environmental.
Eptura’s platform updates align with a period of rightsizing among many commercial building owners and tenants. Occupiers are seeking insights from occupancy and workplace data to improve space utilization, while operators aim to streamline operations by leveraging such information. Against that backdrop, Eptura faces an increasingly competitive markets for technology and real estate service firms — including VTS, Johnson Controls, CBRE, Trane, Envoy and Raise — that have positioned themselves to serve both groups of decision-makers through utilization insights and data-driven building automation and management controls.
Eptura says its unified worktech platform, which combines workplace experience, space planning, preventative maintenance and visitor management tools, also allows technicians to quickly locate assets within large facilities or multi-building campuses, ensuring proper maintenance to prevent downtime and business disruption.
Through this platform and point technology solutions including Archibus, Concedco, SpaceIQ, iOffice and Hippo CMMS, Eptura provides workplace management solutions to over 16 million users across 16,000 organizations, including Comcast, GE, NBCUniversial, Zoom, PepsiCo, Slack, Johnson & Johnson, Unilever and Nasdaq, according to its website.
Eptura’s accessibility-oriented upgrades signal the company’s intent to not only expand access to its product, but also attract operators who are in search of ESG-focused tenants.
Citing World Health Organization estimates, which indicate that 16% of the global population lives with disabilities, Eptura noted that it has implemented design updates in accordance with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines to ensure workplace-wide usability. By designing an accessible solution, the company said it aims to dismantle barriers that prevent workplace engagement.
In addition to the unified platform’s accessibility enhancements, Eptura said it recently updated its integrated workplace management system, Archibus, with accessibility-focused visual enhancements to better support a diverse set of users. That implementation includes new lease customization features, more advanced searching and filtering capabilities in its building information modeling system and heightened security integrations with software company Autodesk.
