January 13, 2015
By Riley McDermid, BioSpace.com Breaking News Sr. Editor
Stanford University will be constructing a more than 95,000-square-foot building for Jazz Pharmaceuticals in Palo Alto, Calif., as the company expands in presence in Silicon Valley, says a company filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
George Fox, Ham Southworth and Matt Wersel of CBRE‘s tenant advisory practice represented Jazz in the proceedings, said the filing.
The lease agreement has Jazz paying $5.50 per square foot per month, with a total 12-year deal value of $96 million, to occupy space in the prestigious 700-acre Research Park complex. Under the terms of the deal, Stanford will build a custom building of 95,000 and 105,000 square feet at 3170 Porter Drive in Palo Alto, though it Jazz did not say anything about consolidating its multiple other operations in the area in the new structure.
The company has not provided additional comment as of filing Tuesday evening.
Jazz makes specialty pharmaceuticals and raked in $204 million in the third quarter of 2014 from its blockbuster narcolepsy drug Xyrem. The company’s decision to double down on Silicon Valley was met with some surprise Tuesday, because Jazz acquired smaller Irish drugmaker Azur Pharma specifically to move its headquarters to a tax friendlier location.
But the chance to find space in the prime real estate Research Park area may have been too much to give up. Stanford Real Estate told the San Francisco Business Times that vacancy is only at 2.6 percent, with rents ranging from $5 to $7, triple-net, or not including expenses.
Jazz’s new neighbors will include “Game of War” maker Machine Zone and med tech Theranos, as well as posh law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, which has a massive project at the site still under construction.
“We’re also seeing newcomers to the Research Park,” Griego told the paper. “We’re really, really happy to welcome Cloudera, Ford Motor Co., and then StartX has gotten a ton of press.”
