The Gulbenkian Foundation is a private, non-profit institution committed since 1956 to the areas of art, education and science. It is the most important institution in the field of culture in Portugal. In the 1960s, a concert hall with spatial acoustics regarded as the best in Portugal was built on its main premises. Of the tenders submitted for the modernisation of this hall, the institution found that the bid by SBS had the best technical concept, resulting in SBS being awarded the contract.
The understage machinery structure of the hall consists of ten mostly two-storey podiums. A special feature of the podium structure is the integration of a large organ, two large film screens and several secondary podiums. The biggest challenge consisted in adapting the new drive system to the existing podium geometry and the extreme space constraints.

As far as the overstage machinery was concerned, it was also necessary to find a solution to accommodate the 35 winches and 42 cable drums in such a way that none of the numerous floor openings existing for the 17 chain hoists would be covered.

Construction work began in August 2013 with the dismantling of the existing system. The complete installation and commissioning of the new COSTACOwin computer control system ensued in the succeeding five months. The system was handed over on 1st February 2014 on schedule and celebrated with an opening concert in the presence of the Portuguese President