Industry News

Corporate Express, a Denver-based, Dutch-owned office supplies firm, is building new distribution centers including a 200,000-sf regional headquarters and warehouse in Hanover, Md. Located near Baltimore/Washington and Dulles international airports, the facility will involve relocation of 300 workers in a consolidation of existing distribution centers in Savage and Elkridge, Md. Construction of the facility is slated to begin in August, with completion expected in June 2003.

CPU Technologies Inc. has leased 41,447-sf in the Hacienda Business Park in Pleasanton to house its primary engineering and manufacturing operations. The site, which will employ 130, is in addition to CPU’s existing R&D facility in Pleasanton.

Sun Microsystems Inc. has selected architect Bottom Duvivier and project manager Kaplan McLauglin Diaz to complete Phase III of its Newark campus expansion. Six two- and three-story office buildings will be constructed by DPR Construction of San Jose. The project began in September of 2000 and is slated for completion in June of 2002.

Novartis AG will lease the entire 255,000-sf Technology Square building and 150,000 sf nearby to establish the Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge. The Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Europe's third-largest drug manufacturer, will invest $255-million in the worldwide research headquarters that will eventually house 900 scientists.

San Antonio-based pharmaceutical company Ilex Oncology expected to close in late May 2002 on a lease of 32,000 sf of newly refurbished Cambridge lab space. Ilex, currently leasing a smaller Boston space, plans to relocate in late fall to the Cambridge facility. The new lab is located in a 128,000-sf, four-story office building converted for lab use being finished by property owner and developer The Beal Cos. of Boston.