Case Study

A Northshore BioTech Company Expands to New Campus; KTS Helps Phase Communications Infrastructure Work Throughout the Project

A New England life sciences company on Boston’s North Shore had a campus that consisted of a number of existing older buildings and the company had plans for construction of a new building to expand the campus. They reached out to KTS to partner with them to plan, design and install structured cabling, wireless access points and data rooms. The project began in July of 2020. The work was phased over time into several parts, and all phases were complete by May 2023.

The Work

The existing campus consisted of: the Mansion, the Gatehouse, the Carriage House, a water treatment plant, a pump house, and a lab building built in 2005. The planned addition to the property, a new lab building, would connect to the Mansion and the existing lab building.

The work was phased into four parts.

Phase I

The new lab building, known as the Garden Facility, was being constructed in front of and connected to the Mansion and the existing Lab Building. There was redundant fiber supporting two data centers – one data center in the Mansion and one data center in the Lab Building. The redundant fiber also supported the Gate House, Carriage House, water treatment plant, and the pump house. KTS disconnected this redundant fiber from the Mansion and pulled it back to an existing manhole so it could be reused. Then, KTS installed new 24-strand, single-mode fiber to the existing lab’s data center in order to ensure that the cameras at the entrance to the facility were up and running. This work needed to be done during off hours, coordinating closely with the IT department.

As construction proceeded, the general contractor moved trailers onto the site. KTS installed a fiber optic cable to connect the trailers to the customer’s network, enabling network connectivity for the general contractor. Once the general contractor began closing in walls of the new building, they requested a data network for the construction space. KTS installed temporary wireless access points and then installed fiber optic cabling to the second floor of the existing Lab Building to support the wireless access points as well as the temporary network set up by the customer for the use of all of the trades working in the new Garden Facility.

Phase II

The second phase of the work focused on the new Garden Facility Laboratory Building.
The work included installing a variety of cabling in the new building. KTS installed over 1,000 Cat 6 cables over three floors; installed over 75 wireless access points and their associated Cat 6A cabling throughout the building; and installed wireless access points in the parking structure.

The new building also has three telecom rooms – one on each floor. KTS installed Cat 6 and Cat 6A cabling to each telecom room to enable desktop connectivity throughout the building. In addition, KTS installed 12 strand single-mode fiber to each telecom room.

144-strand, single-mode fiber was installed from the new data center in the Garden Facility to the existing data center in the Mansion, and additional 144-strand, single-mode fiber was installed from the new data center in the Garden Facility to the existing data center in the Lab Building.

The next part of Phase II involved installing cabling to several areas. First, six-strand, single-mode fiber was installed for the existing cellular BDA system from the existing 3rd floor west IDF in the existing Lab building to the first floor of the Garden Facility. New 12-strand, single-mode fiber was installed from the data center in the garden facility to the Day Cub which is now a generator room/building to support the campus in the event of a power outage.

Phase III

This phase of the project focused on the new data center. The redundant fibers which were pulled back to the mansion in Phase I, were reinstalled in the new data center in the garden facility. The data center contains 13 cabinets with 24-strand, single-mode fiber to each cabinet; the strands converge in a rack and tie into the core switch. There are multiple servers in the different cabinets, so as needed they can patch into the core switch. Additionally, twelve Cat 6A cables were also installed to each cabinet and back to a rack.

Phase IV

The final phase involved working closely with the building automation & security contractor, Schneider Electric. KTS terminated Schneider Electric’s Cat 6 cables on patch panels for the BMS/BAS system, and camera locations. Then, they patched them into the customer’s network to keep everything uniform in the IDFs. Additional collaboration occurred involving variable frequency drives for the HVAC motors; KTS worked with Schneider Electric and the customer’s IT department to ensure all was tested and working as designed.

Challenges

KTS coordinated closely with the general contractor to determine when different aspects of the project were ready for KTS to complete their work. With a large phased project involving many different tradespeople, there is always variability in the timing. Coordinating the schedule and adjusting as needed is paramount and enabled KTS to deliver their components of the project on time and on budget.

One positive element of the project was avoiding any supply issues despite global supply chain disruptions during the project’s timeline. KTS was proactive in planning and ordering what they would need, and they worked with their distributors for months in advance to procure the necessary materials to keep the project on track.

Benefits/Impact

This new life sciences campus is up and running. A strong communications backbone is in place across all buildings with built-in redundancy to support increased demand on the network over time. The Mansion, Gate House, Carriage House, water treatment plant, pump house, Day Cub, and new Garden Facility are all connected to the network via redundant single mode fiber. The campus is equipped with security cameras and cellular wireless connections throughout the campus, so that the employees are safe and productive in their new workplace.