Slide with it: System 180's FlexBoard Pro

They say there are winners and losers when it comes to the Covid-19 crisis. Those companies characterised by entrepreneurship, innovation and agility are the ones who’ll most likely weather the storm. And, indeed, become stronger in the process.

One such company is German workplace-solutions brand System 180. Based in, and producing out of, Berlin, the company has long been fleet of foot, as dynamic as the highly architectural, modular product systems and lines it produces. A toolbox for architects and planners is how System 180 describes what it offers: a series of elements that can be configured in a multitude of permutations. If the brand were a music genre, it’d be jazz. All the building blocks are there, waiting. It’s up to you to freestyle and create new syntaxes, new dialogues, and, through these, new cultures.

Beyond the clear utilitarian function, the various components within the toolbox deliver – be they storage, work surfaces, or elements for supporting collaboration and creativity – perform a valuable interior-architectural function, coming together to create landscapes within larger, open-plan spaces. What’s more, a truly modular and additive system means that, as your team changes and grows, so can the topography of the physical space they occupy.

At the risk of stating the obvious, it’s all about user need. Which is why, baked into System 180’s MO, is a regular open dialogue with existing and would-be clients, as well as partners, to monitor the ever-shifting currents of contemporary work culture, and, most importantly, a rapid-product-development set-up. Ideas can be turned into physical products within weeks, and, once launched, the company’s in-house innovation-loving experts love nothing better than customising and individualising, to ensure their professional customers get exactly what they want.

The latest product to emerge from this process is FlexBoard Pro, an iteration of an existing, double-sided writing- and pinboard, first created by System 180 for capturing all that great output from team brainstorms and dynamic design thinking – but this time for integration into the brand’s shelving system or for wall-mounting. ‘We discovered that not every space is suited to large, dedicated whiteboards,’ explains company designer Nicholas Epstein. ‘With the evolution of open-office layouts, we’re seeing our shelving system used in an architectural way, serving as division walls. We wanted to integrate a writing/pin surface into these partitions without disrupting the modularity of the system.’

Apart from the prerequisite that FlexBoard Pro be compatible with System 180’s 90-centimetre module grid, it was vital the product be of a high quality materially. The team’s research (governed by an optimal price-service ratio) identified ceramic steel as the best contender for the whiteboard, as it’s scratch-resistant and comes with a 25-year manufacturer warranty. The light-fibreboard side, meanwhile, includes recycled plastic compounds.

Central also to the FlexBoard Pro design brief was the requirement that no retro-engineering be necessary. So, the team set about developing a new mounting mechanism – called FlexRail – that could be applied directly to an existing shelving system, and, of course, removed at any time. The result are super-slidable boards for speedy reconfiguration by working teams.

FlexBoard Pro is also lightweight and easily portable, thanks to its integrated, ergonomic handles, meaning your team’s output can go where you go. ‘Besides the fact that we’re offering possibly the first multi-functional agile working board,’ says product manager Manuel von Lübke, ‘we wanted to achieve our own design USP. That’s why we decided on a more dynamic, futuristic grip shape.’

New product development is always a labour of love at System 180. The team is extremely conscious of practising what their products preach: collaboration, creativity, iteration. In addition to the rigorous testing phase, the company is set up internally to bring a critical perspective from a diversity of stakeholders within the company to bear on the product at every step of its development. Cross-divisional involvement means specialists from such diverse departments and operations as assembly, packaging and sales are invited into the conversation. This, in addition to the company’s continual dialogue with the market, makes for fertile ground.

It’s 360 at System 180.

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