Why the modern office has a mobile problem, and what to do about it
There is a quiet frustration running through most modern office buildings. The glass looks spectacular. The interiors are thoughtfully designed. The energy ratings are excellent. And yet, step into the lift, the basement meeting room or the far corner of a deep floor plate, and mobile signal disappears.
This is not a coincidence. The same materials that make contemporary offices energy-efficient (sealed glazing, reinforced concrete, high-performance insulation) are precisely what keeps mobile signals out. And as the way we use offices continues to evolve, the gap between physical design and mobile performance is becoming harder to ignore.
The office has changed. Mobile expectations have not kept up.
Work is no longer something that happens at a fixed desk. People move around buildings all day, between hot desks, meeting rooms, terraces, garages and collaborative spaces. They expect their devices to follow them. When mobile coverage fails, so does productivity.
The issue is broader than convenience, though. Consider a few scenarios that most office managers will recognise immediately.
A visitor relies on their mobile connection because the host company restricts guest Wi-Fi for security reasons. A staff member cannot complete two-factor authentication in the basement. An emergency call fails because the stairwell has no coverage. A video meeting drops the moment someone steps into the lift.
These are not edge cases. They are daily realities in many commercial buildings across the UK, Sweden, Norway and Denmark.
And the stakes are rising. Around 30% of new business laptops now ship with integrated 5G modems, meaning a growing share of enterprise computing is mobile-first by design. The office building needs to keep pace.
The financial case is increasingly clear
For property owners, this is not just a tenant satisfaction issue. The data on connectivity and asset value has become difficult to dismiss.
Research from WiredScore and Cushman & Wakefield points to average rental uplifts of around 5% for well-certified buildings, rising further when digital and smart certifications are combined. According to Boldyn Networks and Newsec, strong indoor mobile performance is associated with meaningfully lower vacancy risk. And a significant majority of tenants (68% in one survey) now consider high-quality indoor mobile coverage a requirement when evaluating premises.
In competitive leasing markets, weak coverage is no longer a minor inconvenience. It is a leasing risk.
What we have done, and what it looks like in practice
The Proptivity approach is to install shared indoor mobile infrastructure that serves all operators from a single system. No separate installations per operator. No legacy repeaters or passive DAS that were never designed for 5G capacity. One digital architecture, built from the ground up for the way modern buildings actually work.
London: The Folgate Building and The Dacre
In mid-2025, two landmark London office buildings became the first in the UK to deploy Proptivity’s advanced indoor mobile infrastructure. The Dacre in Westminster and The Folgate Building in the City were both advised by MAPP, one of the UK’s leading specialists in commercial real estate management.
The system delivers fibre-backed, active mobile signal across the entire building, including lifts, basements and stairwells. The Folgate Building was the first commercial building in the UK to feature Proptivity’s high-performance indoor 5G infrastructure, with EE being the first operator to go live on the system, using the Ericsson DOT small cell solution on a fully multi-operator, JOTS-compliant basis.
Ben Hughes, Head of Building Technologies at MAPP, noted that strong indoor mobile connectivity had become essential to occupiers’ productivity, employee satisfaction and cybersecurity, and that Proptivity’s solution offered future-proofed technology, energy efficiency and alignment with the clients’ ESG goals.
Stockholm: Sergelhusen with Vasakronan
In Sweden, Proptivity worked with Vasakronan to deploy shared indoor 5G at Sergelhusen, a prominent office development in central Stockholm. Together with one of its tenants, Vasakronan set out to explore how mobile-based technologies such as 5G-connected laptops, flexible IT environments and secure mobile connectivity could simplify operations, support hybrid work, and improve the experience for employees and visitors.
As Nicklas Wållberg Walldan, Head of Development at Vasakronan, put it: “It’s not just about strong coverage, it’s about creating smarter, more sustainable spaces that are ready for the future.”
Stockholm: Epicenter
Epicenter Stockholm, one of Scandinavia’s leading innovation hubs, is now live with full gigabit-speed indoor 5G. Speed tests confirmed gigabit performance indoors. The deployment at Epicenter has become a reference point for what a mobile-first office and innovation environment can look like in practice.
How it works, and why the architecture matters
Legacy indoor systems (repeaters and passive DAS) were designed for a different era. They extended voice coverage reasonably well, but they were not built for the data density and device diversity of a modern office.
Proptivity’s approach, reduces power consumption and equipment footprint significantly compared to legacy distributed antenna systems. The antennas are compact and silent. They integrate into finished interiors without visual disruption. Installation at a typical antenna location takes around two hours, including cabling.
The system is shared across all mobile operators, meaning the property owner signs a single agreement and every major operator can deliver service through the same infrastructure. There is no upfront capital investment required from the building owner. Proptivity funds, installs and operates the infrastructure end to end.
A note on Wi-Fi
The question of how indoor mobile infrastructure relates to Wi-Fi comes up in almost every conversation. The short answer is that they serve different roles and are not in competition.
Within leased office floors, enterprises typically run their own secure Wi-Fi systems for managed devices and internal applications. In shared spaces (lobbies, lifts, meeting rooms, garages, stairwells) mobile is often the more practical and secure solution for both staff and visitors. And for voice calls, two-factor authentication and emergency access, mobile is simply the right answer.
A well-designed office building in 2025 needs both. Neither replaces the other.
What this means for property owners
The office market is increasingly one where tenants arrive with mobile-first expectations. They carry 5G laptops and expect to use them throughout the building. They run video calls between floors. They need reliable authentication for security systems. Their visitors rely on their own mobile connections.
An office building that cannot support this reliably is at a disadvantage. Not in a dramatic way, but in the quiet way that affects leasing conversations, tenant renewals and the building’s long-term positioning in a competitive market.
Indoor mobile infrastructure is not the most visible feature of a premium office. But it is increasingly one of the features that tenants notice most when it is absent.
Proptivity designs, installs and operates shared indoor mobile infrastructure for commercial buildings across the UK, Italy, Sweden, Norway and Denmark.
