It’s only fitting that the man whose rezoning efforts paved the way for the creation of Hudson Yards would eventually headquarter his tech companies in the neighborhood.
Intersection and Sidewalk Labs, headed by former deputy mayor for economic development Dan Doctoroff, will be leasing 67,000 square feet of space at the Related Companies’ 10 Hudson Yards office tower, which is now 100 percent leased.
“It’s also somewhat of a homecoming to have Dan and his team at Hudson Yards, since this new neighborhood would not have been possible without his foresight and dedication,” said Related Companies chairman Stephen Ross. “After all, he even named the new neighborhood Hudson Yards.”
Given that Ross and Doctoroff are golf buddies, negotiations probably weren’t terribly cutthroat.
The former investment banker and influential member of the Bloomberg administration was a key figure in New York City’s bid for the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, and he championed the creation of a football stadium on the West Side. That bid never happened, but the proposal paved the way for Hudson Yards, the New York Times reported.
Sidewalk Labs focuses on using technology to address city quality-of-life issues and Alphabet, the holding company for Google, is the parent company. Sidewalk, now based in the Woolworth Building in Lower Manhattan, and other investors acquired Intersection, a tech and media company with a similar mission to Sidewalk.
The Doctoroff-led firms were repped by CBRE brokers Michael R. Laginestra, Rocco Laginestra, Chris Corrinet and Chris Hogan. Related and partner Oxford Properties Group were represented by Robert Alexander of CBRE and Stephen Winter of Related.
The financial terms of the deal were not released, but real estate brokers familiar with the area told the Grey Lady that 10 Hudson Yards tenants are paying between $70 to $80 a square foot.
Intersection and Sidewalk Labs will join Coach, Boston Consulting Group, L’Oréal, SAP and VaynerMedia at the site’s first office building and tenants will be moving in this spring. The Real Deal did a Closing interview with Doctoroff in March of 2015. — Dusica Sue Malesevic