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EFFECTIVE PARTNERING REDUCES COST
When Novo Nordisk Enzyme Business was required to build 6400 m² of i.a. new laboratories and offices in Bagsværd, they chose to go into partnership with M&T and make a break with the conventional working processes. For this purpose, they formed the company Monnet I/S. The joint company carried out the assignment so well that at a cost of around DKK 100 million the building was nearly 15% cheaper than expected. What is more, it was ready to be occupied about 6 weeks ahead of schedule. 'In many conventional building cases it is normal to have to pay a supplement for the contractor to complete the building as quickly as possible. That certainly wasn't necessary here, where the building was handed over just before the summer holiday. This meant further savings for the customer because it is always an advantage to be able to use the summer holiday to settle in. If they had had to move in after the summer holiday, they would have incurred major moving costs,' says John Frandsen. Director John Frandsen of Novo Nordisk Engineering says that although there are many in the building industry who are talking about partnering, not everyone is going the whole length. 'We can write volumes about financial and legal arrangements, but unless we work together to achieve the result, it won't matter how much we write,' says John Frandsen. He recognizes that even though the objective of Monnet I/S was fulfilled with the building in Bagsværd, the parties have not yet reaped the full benefit of the partnership. 'We have avoided a number of the drawbacks of the conventional tender system and we have been successful. But if we want to pursue the partnering idea further, we will need to look at the building process itself. This means in future creating more industrialized, modularized building with prefabricated, larger units if we want to get things done quicker. It's also about time-to-market in the building industry,' says John Frandsen. It was a tight budget which was the background to Novo Nordisk Engineering's experiment with partnering. Quite simply, the company needed to find a new form of partnership and make a break with the conventional process. Normally a building sponsor will hire a consultant to draw up a budget and a project which is tendered to various sub-contractors. It is only when their quotes are received that you know whether the budget is likely to hold. In Monnet I/S, the partners sat together throughout the whole process and, according to John Frandsen, neither of the two highly experienced companies dominated the leadership. Decisions were taken jointly and with respect for the customer's needs and requirements. The project groups from the two organizations took up residence together at Novo Nordisk Engineering, which meant that they were able to work together on a daily basis and save on resources where there were overlaps in the work process. The close cooperation also sharpened participant awareness of the end goal and led to greater joint commitment both in the project and in the actual building process. Novo Nordisk Engineering A/S has 75 years experience as an in-house consultant to the Novo Nordisk Group and in 1991 was converted into a subsidiary which is now the fourth largest consultancy engineering firm in Denmark. The quest for improvementsIt requires a brave customer who is prepared to dispense with the normal market mechanisms. It requires mutual trust between the building sponsor, the consultant and the contractor and a joint striving to achieve the stipulated goal, i.e. to seek quantifiable improvements in the whole building process. Only if you achieve this have you properly fulfilled the term partnering.
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