Industry News

Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) plans to build a new two-building headquarters at Rockville's Tower Oaks development for PG&E's National Energy Group, currently based in Bethesda, Md. PG&E will consolidate operations from Houston and Portland, Ore., at the new 480,000-sf headquarters which will accommodate up to 1,000 employees. The Tower Oaks is owned for the most part by The Tower Co's of North Bethesda, Md.

Nortel Networks broke ground in September on its new $200 million Silicon Valley campus. The new facility will consolidate employees currently housed at more than a dozen Bay Area locations. Completion is anticipated in late 2001 or early 2002.

Oakland Telecommunications Access Center is a $30 million, 113,500-sf telecom facility under development at Oakland's Jack London Square. The state-of-the-art, four-story structure is being constructed by Mortenson Development Co. and will be the first of its kind built to telecom standard levels. Completion is scheduled for May 2001.

Charles Schwab & Company has awarded a $72 million contract to Carlson of Phoenix to design and implement a 250,000-sf data center in Chandler. The new Chandler Data Center will supplement the operations of Schwab's principal facility in Phoenix. Carlson will also function as construction manager and general contractor for the project. Using fast track "design-implement" methods, Carlson will spend seven months building the center, with completion scheduled for October 2000.

NetReach, a host and developer of Websites, plans to transform a 200,000-sf former asbestos manufacturer's warehouse into a high-tech hub for its operations. After $10 million in upgrades, the warehouse will become Two eCommerce Plaza, an "Internet-centric" small business park. NetReach, currently housed in an adjacent 12,000-sf building, will move into the new telecom structure when renovations are completed at the end of 2000. Space unoccupied by NetReach will be made available to other Web-based companies.