Varda Space Leases Former Mattel Facilities in El Segundo

Playtime is over in El Segundo as a space manufacturing startup is taking over the former home of Barbie and Hot Wheels.

Varda Space Industries leased a 205,400-square-foot industrial and creative office building at 2031 East Mariposa Avenue in El Segundo, expanding beyond its smaller headquarters nearby at 225 South Aviation Boulevard, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The building, owned by GPI Companies, sits on 9.2 acres and was built in the 1940s as an aircraft facility and most recently served as Mattel’s research and development center.

The lease deal gives Varda room to scale spacecraft manufacturing as it ramps up launches of its in-orbit pharmaceutical labs.

The company builds automated capsule labs that grow purer molecular crystals in microgravity, then returns them to Earth for use in pharmaceuticals. It has contracts with drugmakers and the military and has more than 10 missions scheduled on SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets through 2028.

Varda, led by former SpaceX engineer Will Bruey, subleased 55,000 square feet of lab space last year from Beyond Meat at 888 Douglas Street, according to the Times. Varda plans to move into the Mariposa Avenue building in December and spend up to eight months building out production and assembly facilities with the goal of constructing 10 more spacecraft by the end of next year.

El Segundo’s aerospace corridor has become one of the country’s tightest industrial submarkets.

Vacancy has fallen to 3.4 percent amid demand from space companies, defense contractors and tech startups, according to CBRE.

Varda is among the new generation of aerospace startups that have grown in Southern California and the South Bay in recent years, particularly in El Segundo. By leasing the former Mattel facility that was once an aircraft plant, Varda’s lease is “a natural continuation” of the building’s “legacy tied to aerospace innovation,” said Michael Woods, a partner at property owner GPI Companies.

— Chris Malone Méndez