Space management involves adapting to constant change, aligning with leadership, and giving your employees a desirable work environment. It’s high-stakes, high-speed, and often thankless. Worst of all, it’s a painfully manual process. At least it used to be.
This month, OfficeSpace announced the acquisition of Dojo, a patented AI technology that compresses planning cycles from months to minutes. Soon, Dojo’s technology will be fully embedded inside the OfficeSpace platform.
Here’s a recap of what we shared in our recent webinar on AI space planning, how it works, and what this means for workplace teams going forward.
Watch the full webinar below:
Why traditional space planning is broken
The conventional way we think about space planning is quickly becoming archaic. Does any of this sound familiar to you?
- Outdated CAD files: Floor plan drawings requiring constant, manual updates and suffering from version control chaos.
- Decisions based on guesstimates: Stack plans are built on old, siloed data, leading to wasted budget on underutilized “ghost spaces.”
- Slow, sequential workflows: The rigid, multi-stage approval process creates bottlenecks that delay critical real estate decisions.
- Inability to manage hybrid: Static systems cannot account for flexible seating, unpredictable occupancy, or the complexity of a modern, hybrid workforce.
“When we asked clients about their biggest pain points, space planning was always number one,” said Erin Mulligan Helgren, CEO of OfficeSpace. “Most teams still spend months building stack plans, updating CAD files, and debating layouts across endless approvals. It’s manual, it’s slow, and it’s unsustainable for the pace of work today.”
She explained how predictive analytics can help teams move faster: “By analyzing real workplace behavior—entries, reservations, meetings, and team networks—predictive models can surface the best layout options and keep them current as needs evolve.”
Instead of siloed data and slow iterations, Erin said, AI planning brings “unified information, instant insights, and confident decisions.”
The new era of workplace planning
Dojo was founded in 2019 with one goal: to make every square foot perform. Dojo co-founder Dan Goldstern, now VP of AI Product Strategy at OfficeSpace, told webinar attendees:
“We built the first patented AI for workplace planning, trained on real client data from hundreds of layouts and hybrid patterns. That time in-market means our models are proven and ready, and now they are at the core of OfficeSpace’s AI roadmap”.
The acquisition makes OfficeSpace the first AI operating system for the built environment. “Dojo brings a mature AI architecture trained on real workplace data over years in-market,” Erin explained. “That foundation now powers OfficeSpace’s next-generation AI models.”
How AI space planning works within OfficeSpace
Dan demonstrated how the platform generates layouts and stack plans in real time using Dojo’s AI Canvas. The days of slow, manual planning are over. You can turn a months-long process into seconds by following these streamlined steps:
- Identify your scope and goal: Begin by selecting the specific floors or buildings you want to optimize directly within the platform. Define a clear objective, such as reducing real estate spend, optimizing for hybrid occupancy, or accommodating a specific headcount increase.
- Integrate predictive data: The AI model instantly pulls and analyzes all available data sources, including occupancy analytics, badge data, room reservations, and even predictive forecasts, to determine the precise amount of space and type of space required for every team.
- Define smart adjacencies: This is where the true intelligence is applied. The platform uses real-world collaboration data (from integrations like Microsoft 365 or Zoom) to understand which teams interact most frequently. This data informs the AI on which groups need to be co-located with which other teams.
- Generate instant solutions: With a click of a button, the AI Canvas automatically generates an optimized stack plan and floor layout that meets your defined goals, required headcount, and team adjacency rules. As Dan noted, this is where you “automate and get an immediate solution… that entire process takes a matter of seconds to complete.”
- Iterate and compare scenarios: You can then adjust variables—such as seat types, density, or flexible neighborhood ratios—and the AI instantly generates new, comparison-ready scenarios. These options can be compared side by side and fine-tuned directly in the platform to ensure the best possible outcome.
This rapid, data-driven workflow eliminates manual redrawing, guarantees data accuracy, and empowers workplace teams to move from strategy to decision with unprecedented confidence.
Real-world results: AI stack planning in action
The true power of AI stack planning is its capacity to deliver immediate, measurable ROI by transforming complex, political, and manual processes into automated, data-driven decisions.
Enterprises using Dojo AI have cut planning time by half, boosted occupancy by two-thirds, and optimized their portfolios by 30 percent or more.
Here is how AI-powered space optimization is creating major wins for large-scale organizations:
Consolidating an underutilized portfolio for $100M+ savings
A major enterprise in New York faced severely underutilized buildings, with some sites operating below 50% occupancy. Instead of relying on guesswork, the client leveraged AI to model true space needs and instantly generate scenario test fits. This comprehensive, data-driven optimization is expected to deliver millions of dollars in savings for each building over the lease lifespans, totaling over $100M across the entire portfolio.
Taking politics out of space planning with data-driven adjacencies
A company planned a significant downsizing, consolidating four floors into two. The critical question of which teams should share space with the executive suite became a “huge political battle” due to a lack of objective criteria.
Dojo AI ended the debate instantly by pulling real collaboration data from systems like Microsoft 365 and Zoom, revealing that the Sales and Marketing teams were the most frequent collaborators with leadership. They were able to then move forward with their restack. By consolidating floors, they were able to save $15M in operating expenses over time.
Linking RTO compliance to major operating expense reduction
A third client was struggling to enforce return-to-office (RTO) compliance and align their space with actual attendance patterns. By utilizing AI to continuously track actual attendance and model optimized layouts quickly, the client developed a strategic plan to save $15 million annually in operating expenses by confidently releasing or subleasing three of their now-identified underutilized floors.
This evidence demonstrates how the speed and predictive power of AI stack planning enables corporate leaders to move from reactive management to proactive, strategic portfolio optimization.
How Dojo’s AI layer is powering OfficeSpace, and what it means for workplace teams
Dojo’s patented AI is being embedded end-to-end across the entire OfficeSpace platform, which means you’ll be able to access AI planning tools directly within your existing workplace environment. With AI that generates scenarios and stack plans instantly, space and occupancy planners can test various layouts, gain alignment and trust across the business, and put plans into motion quickly. This allows workplace teams to focus on strategy, culture, and relationship-building, while maintaining control over space planning.
What is AI space planning?
AI space planning uses real-time workplace data—like badge activity, meeting patterns, and bookings—to generate stack plans, layouts, and optimization scenarios. It helps teams adjust faster, reduce waste, and make data-backed planning decisions.
How fast can AI generate a stack plan?
Space plans can be generated in under five minutes. The platform instantly pulls in usage patterns, seat needs, and adjacency data, and allows for rapid iteration and comparison.
Can OfficeSpace plan for full-scale office relocations?
Yes. OfficeSpace’s AI space planning is designed for the largest enterprise projects, including full-scale office relocations and consolidations. The platform allows you to manage multi-building portfolios, test what-if scenarios for downsizing (e.g., four floors to two), and automate the entire move planning process after the optimal layout is chosen.