Kinaxis Building

The new headquarters for global supply chain company, Kinaxis, is a purpose-built, 153,000-square-foot building located in the burgeoning Kanata West Business Park in Ottawa, Canada.

Kinaxis chose the site to accommodate its growing workforce and maintain close ties with the local community where the tech company has been a fixture for 30 years. Kawneer Collaborative worked closely with the architects, customers and builders to help bring this project to life.

Kawneer Collaborative was established to offer a premium experience to a select audience, creating exciting possibilities in the vast building construction project space.

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A Custom Solution for a Modern Building

The architectural plans called for a unique design feature running the full height of the building. Kawneer created a custom solution by modifying our 2500UT chassis to accommodate a larger, thermally improved cover featuring positive mechanical retention. The 2500UT Unitized Curtain Wall System provides the look of ribbon windows along the perimeter, creating an open, modern aesthetic that allows ample daylight to permeate deep into the office space. By integrating metal panels into our 2500UT system, we were able to provide a single-source solution to the general contractor and owner for the building envelope. This minimized trade coordination and simplified the liability chain for the project.

Project Highlights

Kawneer Collaborative delivered bespoke solutions for the unique needs of the Kinaxis project by focusing on a strong partnership. Kawneer’s dedicated team was involved at every step, from providing initial product samples for the building, to designing, extruding, finishing and fabricating the systems.

Kawneer Collaborative brought expertise and attention to occupant comfort, utilizing thermal modeling to help ensure our products delivered the architect’s specifications. Collaborative integrated thorough understanding by modeling and producing shop drawings for the entire building design in Revit. Collaborative then modeled all manufacturing support in Inventor. Featuring 2D part drawings, 3D CNC files, bills of material and assembly instructions, all content was extracted from the robust Inventor model to produce the project. In addition, the naming convention for client furnished items, such as glass and panels, were incorporated into the model.

Challenges

Architects desired a high-performing façade that contributed to occupant comfort, increased energy efficiency and reduced operating costs.
Time and labor constraints influenced the selection of modular solutions that could be assembled offsite and installed quickly and efficiently onsite.
The modular manufacturing process coordinated multiple suppliers, service providers and distributors.

Products Used

Solutions

Kawneer’s 2500UT Unitized Curtain Wall, 1600UT Wall System^®1 Curtain Wall, 1600UT Wall System^®2 and 350 Thermal Entrances provided a thermally efficient barrier between interior and exterior temperatures in the cool
Ottawa climate.
Façade components were shop glazed and assembled by Transit Glass in a climate-controlled environment and then sent to the site for installation to lower labor costs, time consumption and waste.
Kawneer Collaborative modeled the complete building, allowing the BIM model and shop drawings to come from a single source, adding value to the schedule by saving time and reducing risk.
Kawneer Collaborative produced the fabrication content within the 3D model.
A comprehensive bill of materials was provided.
Kawneer managed the delivery of the materials to Transit for assembly, arriving in the correct order sequence, reducing confusion and storage footprint.