Daniel Zimmer’s job at legacy tech company SAP is to improve the experience of the developers and engineers working there. When the pandemic hit, Zimmer was in the middle of reimagining SAP’s Bay Area footprint, which included leases in San Francisco, San Ramon, and Palo Alto.
The 50-year-old tech company has a global presence, but its approach to office space hasn’t mirrored that of its competitors. “Our offices didn’t look like Disneyland,” Zimmer says. “We didn’t have beach volleyball courts. We always felt like, ‘Maybe that’s what we’re lacking?’”
SAP had eight buildings in Palo Alto and was on the hunt for a marquis location in San Francisco. Zimmer believed that the changes brought on by COVID-19’s work-from-home and hybrid schedules offered the business an opportunity to start fresh with a new approach to its office space.
He’d noticed on LinkedIn that his neighbor, architect Aaron Taylor Harvey, had posted about a new company he launched after leaving Airbnb—an architecture and interiors firm aiming to reimagine the office experience.
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