Broadcom Corp. is closing in on its long-awaited deal to buy the land for its new office campus near Orange County Great Park, according to filings with Irvine City Council.
The chipmaker is working toward the completion of a purchase and sale agreement for the land, which is entitled to hold eight buildings totaling about 2 million square feet, according to recent filings with the city.
The deal is “near conclusion,” according to an Oct. 28 city filing.
Sale terms and a date for its completion have not been disclosed.
As part of the sales and purchase agreement, the city needs to assign development rights currently held by FivePoint Communities Management Inc.—the master developer of the Great Park Neighborhoods land where the office campus would be―to an affiliate of Broadcom, which is listed in filings as “O.C. Property Co.”
“It is generally anticipated that O.C. Property Co. will use the property for the development of a new Broadcom campus in Irvine,” according to a City Council document.
The city’s comments add a bit more clarity to one of the most closely watched commercial real estate deals in Orange County in years.
Broadcom has steadfastly declined to confirm details of the proposed project, either in public statements or in regulatory filings, for most of the year.
Officials with Aliso Viejo-based FivePoint have said they’re not authorized to disclose the name of the occupant of the 78.5-acre campus, which would be near the intersection of Barranca and Alton parkways and close to the Irvine train station.
The largest of the eight offices would be 455,000 square feet, according to filings made with the city this year. FivePoint officials said last month that construction on the campus could begin by January.
The development would be the county’s largest office project in well over a decade and the largest-ever OC office campus for a single company. Broadcom currently leases more than 900,000 square feet at University Research Park in Irvine.
More details on the Great Park project would appear possible by early next month when Broadcom hosts its annual analyst day.
Besides the campus, Broadcom should have plenty to talk about at the Dec. 9 event. The company recently reclaimed the title of OC’s largest public technology company by market capitalization from Irvine-based Western Digital Corp. following a recent surge in its stock.
Broadcom’s market value is about $24 billion. Western Digital’s stock is worth about $22 billion.
Pricey Plans
Denver-based apartment investor UDR Inc. has put a $125 million price tag on the multifamily complex it’s building in Irvine a few blocks from the Diamond Jamboree shopping center.
The company recently began work on 2801 Kelvin Ave., a 381-unit complex at the intersection of Jamboree Road and Kelvin Avenue on the former site of an industrial property.
The project is a joint venture with New York-based insurer MetLife Inc. and is expected to be finished in early 2017.
Another local UDR project, a 173-unit complex in Huntington Beach called Beach & Ocean, opened in mid-October and is already 35% leased, company officials said during a recent call with analysts. That project costs $51 million to build, they said.
No IPO
An initial public offering for Newport Beach-based City Ventures LLC is officially off the books.
The privately held homebuilder withdrew its registration statement for a proposed $150 million IPO in late October. The move was expected; the company hadn’t filed an update to the planned offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission since August 2013.
In an Oct. 24 filing with the SEC, it said it had “determined that pursuing the initial public offering at this time is not in the best interests of the company.”
Company officials declined to elaborate on City Ventures’ plans. The company said earlier this year that it had raised about $345 million from land sales in the first few months of 2014. No other major fundraising deals have been disclosed since.
