Siemens builds on competencies in Greater Zurich

In December 2018, Siemens opened its new campus in Zug with space for several hundred employees. What were Siemens’ main reasons for choosing to build such a future in the Greater Zurich Area?

Matthias Rebellius: Siemens has roots in Zug going back many years, and building technology has a long tradition here. Exactly twenty years ago, Siemens acquired Landis & Gyr and Elektrowatt – two local companies – and merged them with its own building technology operations to form the Siemens Division Building Technologies. Siemens has been based in Zug since then and is one of the largest employers in Central Switzerland. We have highly trained and motivated employees, who embody a culture of strong work ethics and an astute awareness of quality. In addition, cooperation with the city and canton of Zug was and is excellent: it is characterized by mutual trust and is always constructive. Zug is also well integrated in the Greater Zurich Area with its excellent infrastructure.

Siemens has invested 250 million Swiss francs in its future in Zug. What does the new campus mean for the company?

The new buildings on the Zug campus showcase our own modern building technology, which revolves around digitalization and sustainability. The campus is one of Siemens’ first new construction projects to use Building Information Modelling (BIM) for planning and implementation. This is when you create a digital twin of a building before the physical one, a virtual 3D model augmented by technical information relating to the building’s operation. The digital twin makes it easier to construct smart buildings, which are controlled by state-of-the-art building management systems that evaluate data collected by sensors.

To what extent does this promote sustainability?

Smart buildings are connected to energy distribution and storage as well as the smart energy grid, which enables an especially energy-efficient, climate-friendly operation. Our new Siemens Campus is carbon neutral, uses no fossil fuels and was built with ecological building materials. Thanks to modern building management systems, our new office building was awarded the LEED Platinum certificate, the highest sustainability level given by the U.S. Green Building Council. The new factory building was certified with LEED Gold, which is extraordinary for a production building. We are proud of these honours.

Siemens will have a new structure starting in 2019. Will this change anything for the division’s headquarters in the Greater Zurich Area?

Zug will become even more important than it is today when Siemens’ new corporate structure takes effect in April 2019. It will become the headquarters of the new Siemens organization Smart Infrastructure (SI), one of the group’s three operating companies in the future. Building technology will be one of the cornerstones of SI, a corporate division with more than 70,000 employees around the world. In addition to its corporate headquarters in Munich, Siemens will have three headquarters worldwide in the future: Houston in the US for Gas and Power, Nuremberg in Germany for Digital Industries, and Zug for Smart Infrastructure. This is a clear commitment on the part of Siemens to the relevance and potential of Zug and the Greater Zurich Area.

Background information:
Matthias Rebellius is CEO of the Siemens Division Building Technologies (BT), which is headquartered in Zug in the Greater Zurich Area. BT specializes in automation technologies and digital services for secure and efficient buildings and infrastructures across their entire lifecycle. In the past fiscal year, the division increased its sales by 6 per cent. BT employs some 29,000 people worldwide. In Switzerland, 5,740 work for various Siemens companies. Of the 1,700 people employed at Building Technologies in Zug, some 450 work in R&D and around 350 work in production

Interview: Yvonne von Hunnius