One MetroTech signs first tech tenant

In a move that may foreshadow a long awaited change in the Downtown Brooklyn office leasing climate, the neighborhood just signed its first technology tenant, the Wall Street Journal reported. MakerBot, a startup that makes three-dimensional printers, has signed a lease for the entire 21st floor of One MetroTech.

The company plans an expansion that will make its current office space, in Boerum Hill, untenable, and the transportation in combination with new dining in the Downtown Brooklyn area made sense, Bre Pettis, a founder of MakerBot, told the Journal.

“We’re going to put the tech in Metrotech, literally,” Pettis said.

The area has long been dominated by administrative services for large companies whose primary offices are in Manhattan, but that could be changing with the advent of New York University’s new Center for Science and Urban Progress, which announced its plans for 370 Jay Street last month.

The neighborhood would like to cement its place as part of a “tech triangle” spanning Downtown Brooklyn, the Brooklyn Navy Yard and Dumbo, the Journal said, but Downtown Brooklyn still has a ways to go.

“Dumbo has charming cobblestoned streets and views of the city and the waterfront,” Tucker Reed, president of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, told the Journal. “We’re working to create more public space and improve pedestrian access.” [WSJ]