PEPSICO OFFICES

A very important goal of fire protection, in addition to life-safety, is to ensure the continuity of operations. Most high-rise towers, especially mixed use occupancies, have a lift shaft in the core of the building and use glass doors and partitions in the lift lobby at each floor. When the lift lobby is not ‘compartmentalized’ with fire-resistant doors and partitions, flames and smoke spread to all the floors of the building through the lift shafts. The shafts act like chimneys owing to the high pressure difference inside it – as a result the fire immediately spreads to all floors of the building. Therefore, passive fire-resistant glazed systems find application in lift lobby areas.

PepsiCo, one of the largest food and beverage businesses in the world, has one of their offices in Gurgaon, which is the fastest growing Industrial and IT hub in India. The mixed-use property offers a lively and distinctive sense of community and world-class facilities. In this office the lift lobbies are compartmentalized using VDS fire-resistant partitions and VDS fire-resistant glazed sliding doors. These partitions and doors provide a fire rating of 120 minutes with a rating of EW 120 (integrity and radiant heat protection) and EI 30 (insulation). In addition, they provide superior aesthetics since they use Swiss origin systems that are tested as per stringent international fire-test standards at the Thomas Bell-Wright, which is a UKAS accredited lab.