Facilities

The facilities management market in Denmark

Per Anker Jensen,
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Per Anker Jensen, (2010) "The facilities management market in Denmark", Facilities, Vol. 28 Issue: 7/8,
pp.383-394, doi: 10.1108/02632771011042482
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The facilities
The facilities management management
market in Denmark market
Per Anker Jensen
Centre for Facilities Management – Realdania Research, 383
Department of Management Engineering, Technical University of Denmark,
Lyngby, Denmark Received October 2009
Accepted November 2009

Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to present the results of market surveys in Denmark, which have been
based on and used to test a proposal for a new European standard for a taxonomy of Facilities
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Management (FM).
Design/methodology/approach – The market research included surveys of both the client side
and the provider side and was carried out by a management consultant company by telephone
interviews based on definitions developed from drafts for the European FM taxonomy standard by a
university researcher, who is a member of the standardisation work group.
Findings – The proposed taxonomy for FM is in general a good basis for researching the market but
in particular the definition of space including acquisition as well as development, administration,
operation, maintenance and utilities in the same main product is problematic.
Research limitations/implications – The market research is limited to the Danish market, but the
results of the test of the proposed European standard for an FM taxonomy has implications for the
whole of Europe.
Practical implications – The results of the test of the proposed European standard for an FM
taxonomy should lead to adjustments in the way space is treated in the taxonomy before it becomes
accepted as a new European standard.
Originality/value – This is the first time that the proposed taxonomy standard for FM has been
tested in empirical research.
Keywords Facilities, Market research, Denmark, Standards
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
One of the interesting things about Facilities Management (FM) as a field of practice is,
that is a combination of, on one side an internal corporate function under constant
reformation in accordance with the development and the changing needs of the core
business, and on the other side a market in considerable growth and consolidation due
to the increase in outsourcing and the business strategies of a range of different types
of provider companies. This combination of internal and external relationships and
business incentives gives strong dynamic forces, which shape this field of practice and
the related profession and academic discipline. The author has in a recent article in
Facilities presented an empirical study of the origin and constitution of FM as an
integrated corporate function (Jensen, 2008). This article will focus on the external
relationships by presenting a study of the FM market, where a proposal for a new Facilities
Vol. 28 No. 7/8, 2010
European standard on a taxonomy of FM has been used and tested for the first time. pp. 383-394
At the Centre for Facilities Management – Realdania Research (CFM), which q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0263-2772
started in 2008, we have as the first finished research project carried out a study about DOI 10.1108/02632771011042482
 F the Danish market for Facilities Management. We see it as a necessary basis for our
28,7/8 research to get a better documented overview of the FM area in general, and the project
about the FM market is a central element in creating such an overview. The author of
this paper is head of CFM and was project manager of the project. It was done in
collaboration with the consulting company Rambøll Management, who were
responsible for the data collection by a large number of telephone interviews and
384 data analyses, including estimation of the size of the total Danish FM market.
One of the big challenges of researching the market for FM is the lack of a clear
identification and delimitation of this market. Therefore, an important step in the
project has been to make such identification. I have been responsible for this and have
utilized my concurrent involvement in the ongoing European FM standardisation work
in CEN/TC348 to test the proposed taxonomy for FM, which has been developed since
2006 and prepared for public hearing in 2009. I am vice-chairman of the Danish mirror
committee and have been involved in both the technical committee and the work
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groups under CEN/TC348, which developed the first European FM standard on terms
and definitions (CEN/TC348, 2006a) and the new proposal for the FM taxonomi
(CEN/TC348, 2008b).
This paper presents the main results concerning the Danish FM market as well as
the results of the test of the proposed European standard for a taxonomy of FM. The
aim is to make an evaluation of the proposed taxonomy, which can form a basis for
improvements in the taxonomy before it is finalised and approved as an official
European standard. The taxonomy is a crucial element in the development of a
common identity for FM and therefore of great importance for both research and
practice, including how the market for FM can be understood and investigated in the
future.
The paper starts by presenting the state-of-the-art both for the European FM
standardisation and for market research within FM in Europe. Then the research
methodology for the project in general and the market surveys in particular is
explained. After that the main research findings of the surveys are presented divided in
results for providers, clients and the total Danish FM market. The survey results are
discussed and the use of the proposed taxonomy of FM is evaluated. The conclusion
gives recommendations for improvements in the taxonomy.

State-of-the-art
The European FM standardisation
The European FM standardisation work was launched at a meeting i Schiphol Airport
in November 2002. The meeting was arranged by the Dutch standardisation
organisation NEN and the participants included representatives from national
standardisation organisations, FM associations, universities, various institutes and
companies around Europe. It was decided to start joint activities within the frames of
the European standardisation organisation CEN.. The technical committee CEN/TC348
was formally accepted in the summer of 2003. At the first meeting in Vienna in
September 2003 two work groups were established with the purpose to develop
proposals for standards on FM terms and definitions (WG1) and FM agreements
(WG2).
The resulting two standards (CEN/348, 2006a, b) were accepted as European
standards by CEN in 2006. The standards should be adopted as national standards in
 each member country at the latest 1 April 2007. The standards are not mandatory to The facilities
use, but there cannot be other national standards covering the same fields. management
In 2006 CEN/TC348 decided to establish four new workgroups with the purpose to
develop proposals for standards on quality in FM (WG3), taxonomy of FM (WG4), market
processes in FM (WG5) and on space measurement in FM (WG6). Each workgroup has
developed proposals (CEN/TC348, 2008a, b, c, d), and the technical committee has
decided that the proposals should be put out for public hearing in autumn 2009. The 385
proposals are expected to be finalised in 2010 and then go into a voting process for
acceptance by CEN as new European standards. One of the main purposes of the
European FM standardisation is to create a basis for benchmarking across borders and
in 2009 CEN/TC348 has decided to start a new work group to develop a proposal for a
European standard with guidelines for FM benchmarking (WG7).

FM market research
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The state-of-the-art of market research in FM was analysed and evaluated in a recent

article in Facilities by Moss (2008), who questions whether we really have the
“intelligence”. By comparing the estimates for the size of the FM market in UK in
different investigations she shows enormous variations in the results. Some of the
variations are due to clear differences in the definitions of what is included in the
investigations – for instance only integrated FM, only the actual market, or the whole
potential market including or excluding different sectors – but in general it is difficult to
explain the variations. The most recent results were from 2005 and they are also
showing the largest size covering the total potential market with £ 187 billion (e156
billion) by Mintel and £174 billion (e145 billion) by the Centre of Facilities Manchester in
Salford. The methods used in these investigations are mostly desk research combining
various sources of statistics from different sectors and adding them together
In The Netherlands the market for FM has been researched regularly by the
consulting company Twynstra Gudde since 2000. According to their latest
investigation from 2007, the total potential market was e41 billion, while the actual
market was e26 billion. The potential market had grown with 11 per cent from 2000
and the actual market had grown with 21 per cent. The degree of outsourcing had
increased from 58 per cent in 2000 to 63 per cent in 2007. These figures for the turnover
does not cover capital expenses (interest, depreciation), which was estimated at another
e32 billion in 2007 (Kluit and Gijsbers, 2009). The research methods used by Twynstra
Gudde include a combination of questionnaires, interviews, focus groups and desk
research (Herk et al., 2007).
In the Nordic countries in Europe there has been one overall investigation of the FM
market made in 2004 by the Norwegian branch of the international consulting company
CapGemini (Jensen et al., 2008). The result was an estimation of e53 billion for the total
potential FM market in the five Nordic countries. The Swedish FM market was by far
the largest with e23 billion, while the FM market was e12 billion in Finland, e9 billion in
Norway, e8 billion in Denmark and e0.7 billion in Island. The actual market was
estimated as 25 per cent of the potential in general for the Nordic countries, which for
Denmark was equivalent to e2 billion. The investigation was carried out in 2004 and
was based on interviews with 29 large client corporations and seven providers in
Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland and calculations based on the total building
space excluding housing in the countries, including Iceland (CapGemini, 2005).
 F Research methodology
28,7/8 The basis for the research
The starting-point for delimitating the market for FM was the definition in the
European standard from 2006, which since 2008 has been available in an official
Danish translation. According to this definition FM is: “The integration of processes
within an organization to maintain and develop the services which support and
386 improve the effectiveness of its primary activities” (DS/EN, 2008).
This definition does not, however, bring us much closer to an operational
delimitation, but the standard also has a section on the scope of FM. According to that,
FM can be grouped around client demands summarised under two main headings:
Space and Infrastructure (S&I) and People and Organisation (P&O). This is more or
less in line with the commonly used distinction between “hard FM” and “soft FM”.
Following this first standard a new European standard for FM taxonomy has been
proposed as described earlier. This proposal introduces the term classified facility
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products, which are generic facility services that can be compared across organisations
and borders. The taxonomy is a classification of the products of FM in a hierarchical
structure with associated definitions of the classified products. In Table I the left
column state the name of the products in the proposal for a new standard and the
corresponding Danish terms used in CFM’s survey are shown in the right column. An
appropriate Danish translation of “Hospitality” has not been found, and this has been
divided into the two sub-products: Catering and Reception, contact centre and meeting
rooms. (Since the start of the Danish survey a finalization of the proposal for the new
standard has been ongoing. In the latest version it has been simplified by putting
together “Business support finance, Business support HRM and Management
support-organization specific” into “Business support”).
The Danish surveys of the FM market represent the first market research using this
new product structure for FM. The survey has included both the provider and the
client side of FM.

FM products from proposal to new European

standard Danish names used in the survey

Space and Infrastructure (S&I) Ejendomsdrift

Space Bygninger og lokaler
Outdoors Terræn
Cleaning Renhold
Workplace Arbejdsplads
Industry sector-specific Branchespecifik
People and Organisation (P&O) Services
Health, safety and security Sundhed, sikkerhed og sikring
Hospitality Catering
Reception, kontaktcenter og mødelokaler
ICT IKT
Logistics Logistik
Table I. Business support finance Virksomhedssupport – økonomi
Classified products in the Business support HRM Virksomhedssupport – personale
proposed standard and Management support – organisation-specific Ledelsessupport – organisationsspecifik
related Danish terms Organisation-specific Organisationsspecifik
 In order to identify the enterprises the national statistics in Denmark for division into The facilities
sectors and industry branches has been applied. For providers the industry codes from management
2007 (equivalent to the international NACE codes) has formed the basis, including 21
main sectors with a total of 726 industry branches. On this basis ten industry branches market
have been identified which to a smaller or bigger extent cover FM providers. For the
client side the division in the national finance statistics in eight main sectors has
formed the basis, but for this purpose they have been merged together in three groups 387
to which Housing Associations has been added as it is an important FM client that is
not included in national finance statistics. This gives four groups of FM clients. In
Table II the four main client groups are listed in the left column, and the 10 industry
branches are listed in the right column.

The survey methodology

The research is based on two surveys divided into providers and clients within FM.
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The provider survey included 103 enterprises. The data collection with telephone
interviews was done in June 2008. The enterprises were selected through a combination
of suggestions from an advisory group, providers among DFM’s members and among
enterprises with more than 50 employees from commercial market database.
Generally, the enterprises approached were willing to participate. Some enterprises
could, however, not disclose concrete business figures. For some enterprises these
figures have been collected by desk research from the enterprise web pages etc.
Larger enterprises are overrepresented in the surveys for both the provider and the
client side. On basis of the data collected, estimations for the total Danish market have
been made. Especially for the providers this is attached with great uncertainty due to the
non-random selection of the supplier enterprises. But in the client segment the enterprises
have been randomly selected among the four main groups. The estimations for these
enterprises are therefore made with a substantially lower uncertainty. Therefore only the
aggregated results from the calculations based on the client survey are presented.

Research findings
Results for the providers
Of the ten industry branches Construction and Civil Engineering was represented by
far the bigger number of enterprises, i.e. 34 of a total of 103 providers. The five
branches: Real Estate and Renting, Industry, IT Consultancy, Travelling, Cleaning and

The four main groups of clients The ten provider industry branches

Industry etc. 1. Construction and Civil Engineering

Private service 2. Catering
Public service 3. Real Estate and Renting
Housing associations 4. Finance and Insurance
5. IT Consultancies
6. Travelling Agencies, Cleaning and Other Operational Service
7. Waste Table II.
8. Machinery and Electrical Equipment Repair Work The four client groups
9. Transportation and the ten provider
10. Knowledge Services industry branches
 F other operational service and Knowledge services were represented by 10-12
28,7/8 enterprises, whereas the four branches: Financing and Insurance, Catering,
Transportation and Waste were only represented by two-four enterprises. For three
enterprises there is no industry branch stated.
Most of the 103 enterprises provided within Space and Infrastructure (79 per cent),
whereas a bit over half (54 per cent) provided within People and Organisation as shown
388 in Table III. Within S&I, Space was the most common product area followed by
Outdoors, Cleaning and Workplace. Most providers of Cleaning also provide Outdoors.
Within P&O, ICT was the most common product area followed by Health, Safety and
Security, Catering and Logistics.
A total of 74 enterprises have stated their turnover figures, and the total FM
turnover was at e1.5 billion of a total of the enterprises’ total turnover of e5.1 billion.
The FM turnover in each enterprise amounts to e19.9 million in average, and the share
of the FM turnover is 28.6 per cent of the total turnover. The share of the FM turnover
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in the providers’ total turnover varies much within the different product areas and
industry branches. The biggest turnover share for FM is with providers in the product
areas Outdoors, Cleaning, Catering and Business Support – both in terms of economy
and staff. In relation to industry branches FM has the largest share of the turnover in
Real Estate and Renting, whereas FM has the smallest share in Knowledge services,
which i.a. includes lawyers, architects, consulting engineers and leasing of cars, office
machinery and other material.
The number of FM employees is 12,118 in the 90 enterprises that have stated this
figure. This equals 135 employees per enterprise. Seen from an educational
background, unskilled workers in FM services are 21.1 per cent compared to 27.7
per cent unskilled of all employed in Denmark, whereas there is 36.1 per cent skilled in
FM compared to 40.1 per cent skilled of all employed. For these educational levels there
are relatively less employed within FM. In contrast the share of higher educated is

n %

Space and infrastructure 81 79

Space 60 58
Outdoors 37 36
Cleaning 29 28
Workplace 23 22
Industry sector-specific 16 16
Other S&I services 20 19
People and organisation 56 54
Health, safety and security 23 22
Catering 18 17
Reception, contact centre and meeting rooms 14 14
ICT 24 23
Logistics 16 16
Business support – finance 14 14
Table III. Business support – HRM 11 11
The distribution of Management support – organisation-specific 12 12
services from the Organisation-specific 6 6
providers Other P&O services 8 8
 substantially higher with 42.9 per cent within FM compared to 30.6 per cent among all The facilities
employed in Denmark in 2007. management
Unexpectedly, the FM providers are characterized by relatively many higher
educated and few unskilled and skilled employees compared to the total Danish labour market
market. This pattern is, however, varying to a high degree within the different industry
branches. The unskilled constitute the majority of those employed within Waste,
Transportation, Catering and Travelling Agencies, Cleaning and other operational 389
service, whereas the skilled constitute the majority within Construction and Civil
Engineering, Industry and Knowledge services. Only within Financing and Insurance
and IT Consultancies the higher educated constitute the majority.
Based on the average turnover of e19.9 million in 74 enterprises and the average
number of employees with FM services of 135 employees in 90 enterprises, the average
turnover per employee is calculated at e147,536.
By far the majority of the FM providers have clients within all of the four main groups
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of clients, as at least 83.5 per cent of the providers supply to each group. The types of
contracts are also largely split equally on ad hoc services with no contract, fixed price
contracts, hourly rated contracts, fixed agreements/time limited contracts up to one year
and fixed agreements/time limited contracts exceeding one year. In contrast, only 24.3
per cent of the providers enter into contracts with bonus schemas and with penalty
clauses, and only 9.7 per cent with gain sharing. Bonus schemes, penalty clauses and
gain sharing are mainly seen in Construction and Civil Engineering – penalty clauses
are, however, mainly applied with IT consultancies. The methods for price fixing are
mainly market estimates (26.2 per cent) and ad hoc dependent on the service (23.3 per
cent). To a certain extent methods with fixed agreements (12.7 per cent), cost price
multiplied by a factor (11.7 per cent) and cost price plus a fixed amount (10.7 per cent) are
used. Only a few use trade standard price (2.9 per cent).
In relation to expected future development, it is surprising that10 of the 103
enterprises will not focus on FM in future. Of the remaining 93 enterprises, 73.1 per
cent will intensify the cooperation with other providers, and 63.0 per cent will provide
more types of services. 63 enterprises respond to a question on the expectation of their
own growth, and only one enterprise expects a negative growth. Of the remaining
enterprises 35 per cent expect a growth of 0 to 10 per cent, 27 per cent expect between
11 and 15 per cent, 21 per cent expect between 16 and 25 per cent, whereas 16 per cent
expect a growth higher than 25 per cent. The highest expectations were seen in
Construction and Civil Engineering followed by Catering and Transportation, and the
lowest were seen in Financing and Insurance and Waste. These are, however, estimates
prior to the start of the financial crisis in autumn 2008.

Results for the clients

The 272 participating enterprises were almost equally distributed on the four main
groups with 76 private service enterprises, 74 public service enterprises, 88 industrial
enterprises and 56 housing associations. The enterprises are randomly sampled from a
total population of 5,520 enterprises, and the 272 enterprises constitute 5 per cent of the
total population. In relation to the four main groups public service enterprises are over
represented by 18 per cent, housing associations are underrepresented by 2 per cent,
whereas private service enterprises and industrial enterprises are represented
averagely by 5 per cent.
 F For 186 enterprises the costs for FM service are stated, amounting to a total of e700
million corresponding to e3.5 million per enterprise. However, the FM costs vary
28,7/8 extensively among the 4 main groups. For public service enterprises they are e9.4
million per enterprise, and for private e3.0 million. Housing associations and industrial
enterprises are as low as e0.5 and 0.4 million respectively in average per enterprise. In
relation to the degree of outsourcing the differences are substantially smaller. Here the
390 public service enterprises have 51 per cent, whereas the industrial enterprises have 57
per cent, housing associations 64 per cent and private service enterprises 73 per cent.
Almost all enterprises have FM tasks in-house and outsourced. For S&I, 255
enterprises handle the FM tasks themselves, whereas 262 enterprises buy such FM
services from other enterprises. For P&O this applies to 256 and 237 enterprises
respectively. This is far from surprising. On the other hand it is more surprising that
this also is the case for individual types of services as shown in Table IV.
This is not least the case within S&I, where, e.g. 260 enterprises inform that they use
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cleaning, of which 81 per cent buy services, whereas 39 per cent produce it themselves.
Cleaning is the service bought by most. Within S&I there are also more enterprises that
buy the services than enterprises that carry this out themselves when it comes to Space
and Outdoors, whereas the majority of enterprises handle Workplace tasks themselves.
Within P&O the enterprises tend to produce the services themselves rather than
buying for all types of tasks. This is especially seen for Reception, contact centre and
meeting rooms, where only 6 per cent buy services, but also far more enterprises
produce Business Support Finance, Logistics and Business Support HRM themselves
rather than buying services. Catering is the type of services that least produces
themselves and Management Support – Organisation Specific and Health, Safety and
Security are the services bought by most clients.
According to 191 (70 per cent) of the 272 enterprises, most clients foresee no changes
in the FM demand. Only 15 per cent of the clients expect more services, whereas 7 per
cent foresee less services in future. For S&I, most services are expected for Space,
followed by Outdoors and Cleaning. Within P&O the picture is very vague, but ICT is

Clients In-house Outsourced

n % %

Space and infrastructure 271 94 97

Space 264 63 75
Outdoors 252 57 63
Cleaning 260 39 81
Workplace 225 90 24
Industry sector-specific 101 49 63
People and organisation 260 98 91
Health, safety and security 228 72 55
Catering 176 61 49
Reception, contact centre and meeting rooms 234 97 6
ICT 230 75 49
Logistics 201 89 26
Business support – finance 246 96 13
Table IV. Business support – HRM 236 95 26
In-house and outsourced Management support – organisation-specific 232 75 59
services for clients Organisation-specific 97 71 46
 mostly expected to need more services. 4 per cent foresee a negative growth in relation to The facilities
the extent of internal handling, whereas 4 per cent expect a positive growth. As for the
amount of bought services, 4 per cent foresee a negative growth, other 8 per cent expect a
management
positive growth – equally distributed on clients that expect a growth of below or above market
10 per cent respectively in their purchase of FM services. As for the combinations of
services in demand, 18 per cent expect fewer providers with more services, 13 per cent
expect more specialised services, whereas 11 per cent expect both. 391
Results for the total market
According to the survey the total Danish FM market in 2008 is e7.9 billion for the
potential market. This is close to the e8.3 billion estimate from Cap Gemini for the
Danish market in 2004. The survey also shows that the actual Danish market for FM in
2008 was at e4.9 billion. This implies an outsourcing degree of 62 per cent. The size of
the market of FM should be seen in the context of Denmark being a small country with
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5.5 million inhabitants.

The degree of outsourcing at 62 per cent is surprisingly high, when considering the
fact that in 2004 CapGemini’s estimate of the outsourcing degree was only 25 per cent
for the Nordic countries corresponding to e2.1 billion for the Danish FM market.
CapGemini also estimated an 8 per cent yearly growth rate, but with this increase the
e2.1 billion from 2004 would only have grown to e2.8 billion in 2008. Based upon the
CapGemini estimate of e2.1 billion for 2004 and the e4.9 billion for 2008, the increase in
this five year period has been 24 per cent. This is three times as high as the 8 per cent
estimate from GapGemini.
The FM providers are characterized by being relatively big in numbers of
employees and turnover. Part of this overrepresentation of larger providers rest with
the fact, that the sample is not random. Only enterprises with more than 50 employees
were included. The client survey shows that the clients are also often large or middle
sized organizations.
It is the same kind of services that are mostly offered and demanded. For S&I they
are Space, Outdoors, Cleaning and Workplace, and for S&I they are Health, Safety and
Security and ICT. Almost all clients, however, also use Reception, contact centre and
meeting rooms and Business Support Finance, HRM and Organisation Specific, but
most handle it themselves.
The FM services form a major part of the primary business for the providers, but they
are of much less importance for the clients. In average the FM activities amount to 28.6
per cent of the providers’ turnover. In comparison more than half of the clients state that
their FM costs amount to less than 5 per cent of their total turnover.
As previously indicated, the average yearly turnover per employee within FM was
e147,535. Based on the turnover on the actual market it can be calculated that the total
number of employees within FM is 33,167 employees with providers. Assuming a
similar turnover per employee within FM with the clients, there are a total of 53,412
employees on the potential FM market. Thus this survey confirms that FM in relation
to employment is a very important line of business in Denmark.

Discussion
The results of the surveys
The results of the survey are subject to uncertainty and should be interpreted with
reservations. Based on 95 per cent confidence intervals Rambøll Management
estimates e4.8 and 11.0 billion respectively as the lower and upper limit for the size of
 F the potential market and correspondingly e2.7 and 7.0 billion for the actual market.
28,7/8 Further, Rambøll Management states:
It is important to interpret the e4.9 billion correctly. This is the best estimate of the actual
market for clients with more than 50 employees. The survey does not include enterprises with
less than 50 employees. Therefore, it is likely that the actual market in reality is bigger than
e4.9 billion.
392 The estimates of the total potential market must be interpreted cautiously and most likely
show a minimum assessment. The wording of the first screening question (in the client
analysis) is phrased to ensure a substantial number of enterprises already in the market for
FM services from other organizations, so that knowledge on client behaviour and future
expectations is collected.
In connection with the project an advisory committee was established, widely
representing a.o. DFM, DFM-benchmarking and DI Service (part of the main Danish
industry association). The members of the committee represented smaller and bigger
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providers, including the market leader ISS, as well as private and public (local and
national) clients. The committee has had three meetings. At the third and last meeting
where the results from Rambøll Management were discussed, the members generally
agreed on the assessment that the key figures from the Rambøll Management survey
show a realistic picture. For comparison, the representative from ISS mentioned that
they estimate their market share in Denmark to be 10-12 per cent with a turnover of
approx. e530 million.
Supplemented with the above comments from Rambøll Management this supports
the view that the results of the survey represent conservative estimates of the size of
the potential and actual FM market in Denmark.

The test of the proposed taxonomy

The experiences from the project show some challenges in using the proposed
taxonomy of FM in a national market research. Some of these are related to linguistics
when the English standard is used in a country with another language. The problem
with the term “hospitality” has already been mentioned and that was solved by using
the sub-products from the taxonomy and this seemed to work without further
problems. The term “space” also creates linguistic problems in Danish language. The
similar term in Danish is “rum”, which is used equivalent to both the English terms
“room” and “space”. We have chosen to use the combined Danish terms “bygninger og
lokaler”, where the first means “buildings” and the second is related to the english term
“localities”, but it is limited to spaces within walls, floors and ceilings. However, such
linguistic problems will probably exist for any language different from English and
must be dealt with in the translations of the final standard.
A more serious problem is related to the broad way the term “space” is used in the
proposed taxonomy. The definition section of the standard includes the following
definition:
3.4.1.10
space (accommodation)
services for the provision of accommodation like design, build, acquisition or renting of space,
but also the administration and management of space and its disposal
 NOTE 1 It includes the utilities and technical infrastructure (building technique) resulting in The facilities
a comfortable climate and supplying lighting/shading, electrical power, water and gas.
management
NOTE 2 The investment costs of the technical infrastructure are generally included in the market
costs of space. The consequences are that technical infrastructure cannot be a product of its
own on this level.
In annexe A.1 to the proposed standard the following sub-products of space are 393
included:
.
Building initial performance.
.
Asset replacement and refurbishment.
.
Enhancement of initial performance.
.
Property administration.
.
Portfolio optimisation.
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. Maintenance and operation.

.
Utilities.

According to diagram 4.3 of the proposed standard the first three sub-products are
related to acquisition of space and include capital costs (interest, depreciation), while
the last three sub-products – together with cleaning, which is a main product like
space – are related to maintenance and operation of space.
In our surveys we have used the products in the proposed standard as mentioned in
the methodology section and described by stating the sub-products. However, from the
results is clear, that the respondents have not included the cost of space acquisition. If
so, the figures would have been much higher. According to the investigation from the
Netherlands by Twynstra Gudde the capital cost are in between the size of the actual
and the potential market.

Conclusion
The state-of-the-art of market research in FM shows that there are big variations both
in the estimations of the market size and in the methods applied. The study presented
here is the first independent in depth study of the Danish market and by using a large
number of telephone interviews it has covered a larger share of the market than most
FM market studies in other countries. It is also the first market research study to use
the new proposal for a European taxonomy of FM as a basis for identification of the
FM market.
The results of the evaluation of the taxonomy show that particularly the broad way
of using space as a FM product creates problem. It is not in line with the thinking
among practitioners to include space acquisition as well as development,
administration, operation, maintenance and utilities in the same item. The idea to
include space acquisition in the taxonomy is fine and can be a good way forward in
developing the scope of FM and supporting the use of life cycle thinking, but to include
it in the same main product as operation and maintenance is problematic. Therefore it
is strongly recommended to separate the product of space in one or more products for
space acquisition or provision and one or more products for property administration,
portfolio optimisation, maintenance and operation, and utilities.
 F References
28,7/8 CapGemini (2005), More for Less – A Nordic Facilities Management Study 2004/2005.
CEN/TC348 (2006a), Facility Management – Part 1: Terms and Definitions, EN 15221-1.
CEN/TC348 (2006b), Facility Management – Part 2: Guidance on How to Prepare Facility
Management Agreements, EN 15221-2.
CEN/TC348 (2008a), Facility Management – Part 3: Guidance How to Achieve/Ensure Quality in
394 Facility Management, prEN 15221-3.
CEN/TC348 (2008b), Facility Management – Part 4: Taxonomy of Facility Management –
Classification and Structures, prEN 15221-4.
CEN/TC348 (2008c), Facility Management – Part 5: Guidance on the Development and
Improvement of Processes, prEN 15221-5.
CEN/TC348 (2008d), Facility Management – Part 6; Area and Space Measurement, prEN
15221-6.
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DS/EN (2008), Facility Management – Del 1: Terminologi og definitioner (in Danish and English),
DS/EN 15221-1, 2nd ed., Dansk Standard, 30 June.
Herk, M.v., Diepen-Knegjens, C.v., Kluit, J.v.d. and Maas, G. (2007), Facility Management in The
Netherlands – Market Analysis 2007, Twynstra Gudde, Amersfort, 21 February.
Jensen, P.A. (2008), “The origin and constitution of facilities management as a corporate
function”, Facilities, Vol. 26 Nos 13/14, pp. 490-500.
Jensen, P.A., Nielsen, K. and Nielsen, S.B. (2008), Facilities Management Best Practice in the
Nordic Countries – 36 Cases, Centre for Facilities Management – Realdania Research,
Technical University of Denmark.
Kluit, J.v.d. and Gijsbers, E. (2009), “Growing market”, Premises and Facilities Management,
April.
Moss, Q.Z. (2008), “FM market research review: do we really have the ‘intelligence’?”, Facilities,
Vol. 26 Nos 11/12, pp. 452-62.

Further reading
Jensen, P.A. (2009a), Markedet for Facilities Management i Danmark (The Market for Facilities
Management in Denmark), Research Report, Centre for Facilities Management – Realdania
Research, Technical University of Denmark. June, available at: www.cfm.dtu.dk
Jensen, P.A. (2009b), “The market for facilities management in Denmark”, Report presented at
EuroFM seminar, ISS, Copenhagen, 11 September, available at: www.cfm.dtu.dk.

Corresponding author
Per Anker Jensen can be contacted at: pank@man.dtu.dk

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