Industry News

Navy Marine Corps.' Intranet network operations center at North Island Naval Air Station in San Diego is nearing completion. A total of six such centers are planned for the network, with a second one to be built in Hawaii. The center project, which will link all Navy and Marine land facilities in the continental U.S., is headed by a consortium of private companies called the Information Strike Force, lead by Electronic Data Services Corp. of Plano, Texas.

XO Communications Inc. is considering the construction of a 300,000-sf building at a 40-acre site in Richardson to consolidate its 1,500 Dallas-area employees. The project would include a large regional training center as well as an 80,000-sf data center to accommodate Web hosting, server management, collocation, and related services. XO is working with The Staubach Co. on the potential consolidation.

Trellis Photonics, based in Israel, has plans for a 60,000-sf manufacturing facility at the Columbia Gateway Business Park. The $18 million building will accommodate the fiber-optics firm's research, administration, and manufacturing operations. The company's $25 million, five-year growth plan includes a staff increase from the present 150 employees to 350.

The Atlanta Telecom Center, a multimillion-dollar project of Montreal-based Yale GSG Lee Real Estate Ltd., has opened in Atlanta's West End. Yale Provided site selection, financing, design, and engineering to convert the former Alterman Foods Inc. warehouse to a telecom hotel. Upgrades include a new roof, multiple fiber entrances to the structure, and distribution throughout the building of that fiber. Nearby fiber-optic trunk lines have attracted telecommunications companies to the area.

Meredith College has a new $20-million, 80,000-sf collaborative science building under construction. Designed by BJLAS Architecture and built by Rogers Builders of Charlotte, N.C., the facility will promote interaction by bringing together the various science subspecialties, rather than isolating them by floor. The most expensive lab space—that used by the departments of chemistry and biology—will be grouped together. Four to six students will work together at lab ‘islands’. Small group study alcoves will be located throughout the structure.