VTS’s $100 Million Acquisition Of Rise Buildings Signals A New Era For Digitized Tenant Engagement

VTS’s $100 Million Acquisition Of Rise Buildings Signals A New Era For Digitized Tenant Engagement

In March 2021, real estate lease management platform vendor VTS announced that it will acquire Rise Buildings for $100 million. Rise Buildings is a workplace mobile app provider that integrates multiple real estate systems to enhance the tenant experience of commercial real estate. It targets real estate owners, developers and property management firms, and is currently live in around 350 properties. Customers leverage Rise Buildings for access control, operations management, occupant engagement, data insights and monetarization tools. Landlords such as CIM Group, Hines and Sterling Bay are examples of customers that use Rise Buildings’ platform.

VTS plan to push out Rise Buildings to its existing client base of landlords, for whom it manages over 11 billion square feet of commercial real estate (CRE). VTS will initially use Rise Buildings to support occupiers’ return-to-work initiatives such as COVID-compliant employee and visitor access. Beyond this, it will look to use Rise as part of an end-to-end CRE asset management proposition covering leasing, marketing, tenant experience and building management.

The acquisition will help VTS improve its competitive positioning as landlords urgently seek to improve tenant engagement. Indeed, the CEO of VTS stated that the purchase of Rise is part of its strategy to digitize the tenant experience and provide landlords with a full-service platform. With repeated lockdowns and tenants fighting to exit leases early, landlords are looking to implement new digital strategies to make their buildings more flexible and adaptable. As part of this, they are turning to mobile apps to meet tenants’ rising expectations of workplace technology that supports on-site collaboration and access to workplace services.

With many occupiers exploring options to downsize offices and move to hybrid working, a growing number of landlords will be eager to tap into the opportunity for a more digitized workplace experience. To find out more about the future evolution of workplace experience apps, which innovative firms such as essensys, HqO, Lane, OfficeApp and Rise Buildings are developing, read our recent report, Strategic Focus: Using Mobile Apps To Bring A Digital Experience To The Workplace.