Investors buy Seagate building in Cupertino
CUPERTINO >> Seagate Technology has sold a big Cupertino office building to a realty investment firm in a deal that points to ongoing interest in that Silicon Valley market.
Rubicon Point Partners was the buyer of the office building in a deal that was completed on June 18, according to Santa Clara County public records.
The building that Rubicon bought from Seagate totals approximately 140,000 square feet and is located at 10200 S. De Anza Blvd. in Cupertino, according to property databases and county assessment records.
“Rubicon sees this is as a good opportunity,” said Erik Hallgrimson, a vice chairman with Cushman & Wakefield, a commercial real estate firm. Hallgrimson assisted with underwriting in connection with the property transaction.
The building was bought by Rubicon for $107.5 million, the county property records show.
In 2013, Seagate, a maker of data storage devices such as disk drives, shifted a big chunk of its research and development operations in Silicon Valley to the East Bay by creating a $180 million tech center in Fremont.
The Fremont building, located at 47488 Kato Road, totals roughly 411,000 square feet. The building once was occupied by failed solar equipment maker Solyndra.
At the time of the Fremont expansion, Seagate Technology indicated it would hang on to the Cupertino offices. But that appears likely to change with the sale of the Cupertino site.
“Seagate plans to move out” of the Cupertino offices, Hallgrimson said.
The timing of an exit from Cupertino wasn’t immediately known. Seagate didn’t immediately respond to requests for a comment about the situation.
However, in a regulatory filing on Aug. 2, Seagate Technology referred to the sale of a property in North America. The 10-K filing covered the fiscal year that ended on June 27 of this year.
“During fiscal year 2019, the company completed the sale of certain property in the Americas and recorded a gain of approximately $78 million,” Seagate said in the Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Seagate didn’t specify the precise location of the property.
Cupertino boasts a strong enough office sector that Rubicon could well find a tenant to fill the spaces in short order.
Apple leases and owns numerous office buildings and complexes in Cupertino, including the doughnut-shaped Apple Park headquarters campus.
On Aug. 19, Apple completed a $290 million purchase of two office buildings around the corner from where Rubicon bought the Seagate building. Apple had been a tenant in those office buildings at the corner of Stevens Creek Boulevard and Torre Avenue and chose to become an owner rather than a renter in that instance.
Also nearby: Amazon’s Lab 126 research and development arm has leased a big office in Cupertino.
“Cupertino is a high demand market,” Hallgrimson said. “There should be good interest in leasing the office.”