Industry News

Siemens Medical Systems, based in Iselin, N.J., is expanding at its 20,000-sf service and training center in Cary. The addition of a four-story training center and a two-story parking deck will bring the total space to 65,600 sf. Completion of construction is anticipated by the end of 2001. The company is a subsidiary of Siemens AG, the electronics company based in Germany.

The Department of the Interior’s 1.3 million-sf 1930s-era building is scheduled for  modernization. The General Services Administration has awarded Grunley Construction of Rockville, Md., a $18.6 million construction contract for phase one of the project—HVAC central plant work on several levels, some demolition and new construction in part of the building’s northernmost wing. The building currently accommodates approximately 2,500 employees. Completion of the entire project is anticipated in late 2008.

Scott Adams, cartoon creator of the Dilbert comic strip, is working with design firm IDEO of San Francisco to develop “Dilbert’s Ultimate Cubicle”—an almost office-sized prototype for a workspace comprised of orange and white translucent plastic modules. The modules each perform a different function—file storage, cooler, coat hanger, fish tank—and could be configured by employees to create their own ideal workspace.

 Intuit, the Mountain View, Calif.-based creator of financial software, has plans for a new three-building state-of-the-art campus in Reno. Construction over the next two years will see the first structure completed around November 2001, the second in spring 2002, and the third in late 2003. At build-out the 150,000-sf office complex will seat approximately 850 employees.

VeriSign, an Internet services company, plans to consolidate eight Northern Virginia offices at Waterview I, a 405,000-sf office building under construction in Herndon designed to accommodate 1,600 employees. Tishman Speyer Properties is developing the project, which is scheduled for completion in October 2001. VeriSign has an option on two as-yet-unbuilt structures -- Waterview II and Waterview III -- which will total 450,000 sf.