Industry News

Seattle-based Washington Mutual will occupy 37,000-sf at EmeryTech in Emeryville, Calif. The bank will move its marketing department and some technology staff into the facility in November. The building will house employees from Santa Rosa, Oakland, and Chicago, where Washington Mutual will maintain its leased presence.

Malvern-based Centocor, a maker of cardiovascular and arthritis drugs, has leased 158,000 sf in the Radnor Technology Research Center. Centocor will utilize the two top floors of the five-story research building and the 44,000-sf basement vivarium. A condition of the lease was that previous tenant, Wyeth-Ayerst, decommission labs in which toxins had been used in research.

Madern USA, subsidiary of the Dutch rotary tool maker Madern, will build a 25,000-sf to 30,000-sf facility on six acres purchased in Apex, N.C.'s Pinnacle Park. The facility will house an expanded production line and enable the company to double its workforce over the next few years. As the Dutch company's sole plant outside the Netherlands, Madern USA is currently housed in 7,000 sf of leased space in Pinnacle Park. 

Emory University's $82.7-million Whitehead Biomedical Research Building has earned a Silver certification according to the LEED building rating system as established by the U.S. Green Building Council. Designed by the Atlanta office of Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum (HOK), the 325,000-sf, eight-story building opened in November 2001 and is the first building in the Southeast U.S. to achieve LEED certification, and one of only 24 LEED-certified facilities in the nation.

The Memec Group of San Diego will relocate in March 2003 from 70,000- f in two Sorrento Mesa buildings to a five-story, 115,000-sf facility under construction in Del Mar Heights. The global semiconductor distributor will initially occupy 92,000-sf with an option to lease the remaining 23,000-sf within one to two years.