Industry News

Honda Power Equipment Manufacturing (HPE) is investing $30-million in an expansion of its Swepsonville factory. The project will add a third production line, implement facility improvements, and create an additional 200 full-time jobs. Slated for completion in early 2004, the expansion will increase HPE's capacity for multi-purpose power equipment engines by 50 percent to 1.5 million units annually in 2004.

The Texas Pain Institute has broken ground on a $1.5-million facility. The two-story, 14,000-sf facility is part of the planned La Hacienda de Salud medical subdivision sited on 5.92 acres in San Antonio's South Texas Medical Center. The development, where physicians will own their own land and buildings, will eventually total up to 70,000-sf of health care and related space in nine buildings and cost approximately $10-million.

The U.S.

Miramar College in San Diego is building the $2-million, 10,000-sf Advanced Transportation Technology Center. Housing two general purpose classrooms, seven interior auto bays, five faculty offices, three storage rooms, and over 10,000-sf of exterior work space, the facility will contain millions of dollars of tools and equipment supplied by Toyota Motor Sales USA. Miramar College is also working with Kvaas Constructors to build the $7.2-million, 41,850-sf Science and Technology Center in Mira Mesa.

Pixar Animation Studios has doubled plans for its Emeryville, Calif., campus to include three new buildings and a two-story parking garage. In addition to its existing 215,000-sf building, each of the new facilities could comprise up to 160,000 sf each. The first building will be sited on an undeveloped portion of Pixar's 14-acre campus. The second building will be constructed on the existing campus parking lot, and the third will replace the former Semifreddi's Baker Building purchased by Pixar, located across the street.