Riding a wave of record sales growth, Solace is the latest Kanata tech firm to expand its real estate footprint as it prepares to call employees back to the office. Solace, which makes software that helps optimize the flow of data through wireless networks, is on pace to set an all-time revenue high in the […]
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Riding a wave of record sales growth, Solace is the latest Kanata tech firm to expand its real estate footprint as it prepares to call employees back to the office.
Solace, which makes software that helps optimize the flow of data through wireless networks, is on pace to set an all-time revenue high in the current quarter that will end on Jan. 31, 2024.
The next day, Feb. 1, will mark the start of a campaign that will see many of Solace’s Ottawa-based employee workers return to their desks a minimum of three days a week at a new location – the third floor of an office building at 4000 Innovation Dr. in Kanata North.
The company is subleasing a 56,600-square-foot space that was formerly occupied by Mitel, which renovated it just months before the pandemic struck. The deal runs until 2035.
Solace chief executive Denis King said the company – whose operations are currently spread out over several floors at nearby 535 Legget Dr. – had been mulling over the idea of relocating even before COVID hit.
“It was very hard to keep teams together,” King said. “I think we were looking for some refresh – just some newer, more collaborative space with more meeting rooms.”
The health crisis put those plans on hold. For the past three years, Solace employees have been working remotely.
But King says the time has come for a more “middle-ground” approach that will allow workers in fields such as product development to gather in person several times a week and swap ideas – a process he says is essential to fuel innovation.
“I think we always believed we would be back in the office,” he told Techopia on Friday. “I think we were waiting for the right opportunity.”
The new location will bring all employees together on one floor with three times as much meeting space as the company’s current setup on Legget Drive. Other amenities in the building managed by Colonnade BridgePort include an outdoor patio as well as shared facilities such as a gym, auditorium, games room and cafeteria.
“We were looking for something that specifically had a ton of collaborative space,” King said. “Coming into the office now is more about meetings and being with people and working as a team and collaborating with people. It’s not necessarily going to your cubicle.”
The company will continue to lease space on Legget Drive for activities such as shipping and receiving of goods and will also rent other laboratory facilities in the city, he added.
Solace now has a workforce of more than 500, a number that is projected to grow by up to 150 people over the next couple of years. On any given day come February, King said, between 250 and 300 employees are expected to be on site at Innovation Drive.
Solace did not survey its workers to gauge their thoughts on returning to the office, King added.
As CEO, he said he believes face-to-face interaction among employees is essential for the company to function properly.
“We’re never going to make everybody happy,” King explained. “For every person you find that cannot wait to get back to the office, there’s another person that actually has no interest in going back to the office. That’s just the way it is.
“We know there is a significant percentage of the company that is feeling disconnected, feeling like they’re not a part of the team and are feeling like they’re not getting the appropriate mentorship required. I think being together is something that rises above any one individual.”
King said there are bound to be bumps in the road as the company navigates through the transition.
“Now the challenge is … coming back Feb. 1, not everybody is excited, and I think that's normal,” he said. “I think we’re going through that period now of answering all the questions and getting through that period of frustration where people have to change, and I think that’s going to take the better part of a year before people are settling in.”
King is part of a group of Ottawa CEOs, including Kinaxis boss John Sicard, Ross Video majority owner David Ross and Calian chief executive Kevin Ford, that gets together once a month to discuss issues facing their businesses.
The back-to-office conundrum has been front and centre for the past two years. King said that while some firms like Ross Video are still leaning more toward a work-from-home model, others such as Kinaxis – which opened a new corporate headquarters on Palladium Drive last year – are going “all in” on returning to pre-COVID modes of work.
“Everybody has different circumstances,” King said. “I would say we’re somewhere between what John’s doing and what David’s doing. It’s not going to be easy, but I think we will get there. I think this is absolutely the right decision.”
At the same time, he added, the company realizes a one-size-fits-all approach is not the way to go.
“We do need to be more flexible,” King said. “Going back to five days a week and being rigid on all of that, I think that’s crazy.”
Solace is following in the footsteps of other Kanata-based tech companies that are pulling up stakes and moving to more modern workspaces as employees spend more time in cubicles and meeting rooms.
Alan Doak, a principal at Ottawa’s Proveras Commercial Realty who helped broker Solace’s sublease with Mitel, said he expects the trend to continue as other firms re-evaluate their long-term real estate needs.
“It’s caused executives and senior leaders to be much more introspective about their internal office environments, which I think over the long run will be very positive,” Doak said. “You can’t call people back to an old, crummy space.”
