Bio-Rad fills up business park
RICHMOND — A big new lease by Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc. has completely filled up an industrial park here and spurred the developers of the complex to launch a major expansion of the project.
Bio-Rad has rented 116,000 square feet of industrial warehouse and distribution space in Pinole Point Business Park in Richmond. The life sciences equipment company is moving to the business park in northern Richmond from a site at the south end of the same city.
Hercules-based Bio-Rad will move about 60 employees to the building, said Tina Cuccia, a Bio-Rad spokeswoman. The new location represents an expansion for Bio-Rad, which will exit a smaller building that the company has been renting from the University of California. The university wants Bio-Rad's current building for its own uses. Bio-Rad's lease with the university was expiring.
"Bio-Rad continues to do well and this new location in Richmond will provide us with continued room for growth," Cuccia said.
The life sciences company in 2007 earned $93 million on revenues of $1.46 billion. Compared with 2006, profits fell 9.9 percent in 2007, but revenues rose 14.7 percent.
Bio-Rad expects to occupy its new site at the business park by February 2009, located at the intersection of Atlas Road and Giant Highway. The deal was arranged through Colliers International realty brokers Brooks Pedder, Phil Garret, Todd Severson and Greig Lagomarsino.
With the Bio-Rad signing, the existing 500,000-square-foot business park is 100 percent leased. And the deal also represents a coup for Sares Regis Group, the realty company that bought the Pinole Point complex in May for about $50 million.
"The demand for industrial is really quite healthy," said Jeff Birdwell, president of the commercial division of Sares Regis. "There is a level of vibrancy in the industrial market."
Now, Sares Regis intends to begin construction within nine months on an additional 600,000 square feet of industrial space in the project, Birdwell said. That is expected to add three or four buildings to the business park.
"There is really a great opportunity to build some product on speculation," Severson said. "The developers should be very successful."
Multiple companies were interested in the building that Bio-Rad ultimately leased, Severson said. That's because top-quality industrial space is not plentiful along the Interstate 80-880 corridor.
"Tenants want to be close to the Oakland port and airport," Severson said.
George Avalos covers jobs, economic development, commercial real estate, finance and oil companies. Reach him at 925-977-8477 or gavalos@bayareanewsgroup.com
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