W Group is one of the foremost developers of premier office buildings in Manila, the capital of the Philippines. In the financial district of Bonifacio Global City, W Group recently completed two state-of-the art office buildings: The 25-story Citibank Plaza building offers 50,000 square meters of offices spaces, while the 29-story W City Center boasts 55,000 square meters of offices plus three stories of retail space.

Citibank occupies the entire Citibank Plaza building, while W City Center is home to a range of local and internationals enterprises. Every tenant has different needs in terms of floor plans: Call centers require open spaces while other businesses divide entire floors into individual offices.

Putting the safety of tenants first, security managers at W Group needed a fire alarm system that allowed for central management of each building in its entirety while accommodating unique tenant safety needs. They commissioned Bosch Philippines to equip Citibank Plaza and W City Center with a seamless interface of fire detection and public address systems in a scalable solution.

At both locations, Bosch experts installed advanced optical smoke detectors – 2,000 units at Citibank Plaza and over 1,300 at W City Center – for quick and accurate fire detection, supplemented by heat detectors and manual call points. Connected to the Modular Fire Panel 5000 Series, the number and positioning of detectors can be adjusted and expanded flexibly to meet every tenant’s floorplan.

The IP-based system provides full visibility to operators: Each building floor is defined as its own zone, while addressable smoke detectors report the exact location of a fire down to a specific room. For ease of maintenance, the advanced detectors perform constant self-monitoring and send cleaning or replacement alerts to the Modular Fire Panel 5000 Series. At Citibank Plaza, the solution is part of the Building Integration System (BIS) from Bosch, allowing operators to use the BIS Automation Engine as the graphical user interface for monitoring and control of alarms on a single platform.

The system features Smart Safety Link – a superior interface between the fire alarm system and the Plena Voice Alarm System (VAS) from Bosch. This secure interface can be set up and configured in a matter of minutes through the RS232 connection (serial interface standard). By comparison, creating a point-to-point connection for ten evacuation zones would require up to two hours. The Smart Safety Link achieves an added level of security: In case of  fire or emergency, operators can conduct an evacuation by zones in order of priority. Evacuation starts with occupants closest to the threat – building occupants are addressed over separate loudspeaker zones – then moving on to adjacent floors for a highly effective approach to an emergency. The Plena VAS provides clear pre-recorded voice instructions supported by coordinated horn and strobe alarms. This combination of fire alarm and voice instructions achieves time for emergency responders.

Meeting the requirements of the developer, the interfaced Bosch system has proven an asset at Citibank Plaza and W City Center. The flexible and modular system is easy to expand and adjusts to changing tenant needs, while the seamless interface between fire alarm and public address creates a complete safety chain from earliest detection to orderly evacuation.