Brighton Management LLC, an Irvine-based hotel developer and manager, is looking to double down on plans at the Newport Dunes marina property in Newport Beach.
The company is in the early stages of preparation to build a pair of hotels on a portion of the 102-acre recreational facility, which is on county-owned land near the intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and Jamboree Road in Upper Newport Bay.
It has proposed to build a Holiday Inn Resort and a Staybridge Hotel on a 14.3-acre portion of the land, according to county documents. The hotels would total 275 rooms.
Brighton Management recently took over as the hotel developer for the project from Santa Monica-based Windsor Capital Group Inc., according to county documents.
Windsor had proposed a single hotel for the land, which the county has leased to Waterfront Resort Properties LP and Newport Dunes Marina LLC through 2039.
A groundbreaking for the hotel projects isn’t planned anytime soon. City and California Coastal Commission approvals are still required, among other time-consuming entitlement processes.
Orange County’s board of supervisors addressed the proposal this month. Plans would require a revised sublease between Newport Dunes and Brighton in order to “allow a realistic time period for Brighton to obtain all requisite approvals,” according to county documents.
The developer, under terms of the proposed revised lease, would have until the end of 2020 to obtain entitlements, with extensions up to 2023.
Brighton is “working toward the development of conceptual plans and is proceeding with the entitlement process,” according to county documents.
The Holiday Inn Resort and Staybridge Hotel would be “value-oriented accommodations” for guests, with the latter geared toward extended-stay guests, county documents note.
The hotels would likely share an entryway and some facilities in order to keep the total project under 500,000 square feet, which is a development condition tied to the site.
Privately held Brighton has about 40 hotels under management, including properties in Anaheim and Costa Mesa.
Cryoport to Irvine
Cryoport Inc., a hi-tech logistics company that serves the life sciences industry, moved its headquarters from Lake Forest to Irvine.
The company recently opened offices at 17305 Daimler St., a nearly 55,000-square-foot building near the Costa Mesa (55) Freeway.
Cryoport is leasing 27,600 square feet there for corporate offices, warehouse space, and a research and development facility. That’s more than double the size of its previous location in Lake Forest.
The company’s seven-year lease comes with an initial monthly base rent of about $21,600, or about 87 cents per square foot, according to regulatory filings. It can extend the lease for two additional five-year periods, the filings show.
The facility is owned by Newport Beach-based Panattoni Development Co., which paid a reported $5.9 million for it this past March.
The developer retrofitted the then-vacant building into what it calls a “creative industrial” space, with high-end offices and worker amenities, along with warehouse space.
“We think this could be a new prototype for the area,” Panattoni Partner Steve Batcheller told the Business Journal in August.
The rest of the space remains vacant, according to CoStar data.
Cryoport describes itself as “experts in deep-frozen shipping for biological materials” and uses cryogenic technology to ship life sciences products cold.
This year it announced it was the cryogenic logistics partner for distributing Irvine-based diagnostic test provider CombiMatrix Corp.’s new CombiPGS genetic screening test, which is used by couples who want to increase chances of a viable pregnancy through in-vitro fertilization.
“Our new facility is integral to supporting the increasing volume and client activity we are experiencing and for which we are planning,” Cryoport Chief Executive Jerrell Shelton said in a statement.
Cryport’s market value is about $18 million. It earned about $1.4 million last quarter, a 74% increase over a year earlier.
