P3’s long-term customer, Amazon, approached us with an opportunity to tender for a massive Built-To-Suit fulfilment centre project in the township of Castelguglielmo, in northern Italy. Thanks to our competitive offer and successful track record with the world’s largest e-commerce platform, we won the contract and were tasked with realizing our biggest-ever development project.
The four-storey fulfilment centre covers an area of 189,000 m², of which 137,000 m² is dedicated to robotic warehousing and 5,500 m² to offices. The building achieved a BREEAM ‘Very Good’ sustainability certification upon completion.
Due to the clay subsoil at the site, the construction of such an extensive building was very demanding, requiring an extremely robust foundation. Another specific feature was the customer’s request for a super flat, smooth floor in the hall which houses the robotic operations. This necessitated the use of highly-specialised construction procedures.
During the construction of this mega-project, we implemented several ‘change orders’ at the request of the customer, many of which required significant shifts in planning and execution.
The land in Castelguglielmo is located at the border of two districts, which required negotiations with representatives of both municipalities, and a constant search for consensus in order to minimize the impact of development upon local infrastructure and communities. During the construction process, we were asked by the municipalities to develop a new sewage treatment plant and subsequently to build a new roundabout on the local road network.
The entire construction process took only 18 months, even though it was implemented during the height of the global health crisis in 2020.
This project fulfilled the customer’s requirements and brought many benefits to the community, in terms of tax revenues, job creation and business opportunities. Moreover, it strengthened our mutual relations with the customer and local municipalities.