Seagate Technology Holdings, an Ireland-based hard drive maker looking to lay off workers, wants to sell its 31-acre Fremont research campus for $300 million and lease it back.
The computer hardware company seeks to sell and then rent its 575,000-square-foot campus at 47488 Kato Road for seven years, the San Francisco Business Times reported, citing a marketing brochure.
Cushman & Wakefield represents Seagate in the sale lease-back.
The move comes as Seagate Technology plans to cut its global employee headcount by nearly 8 percent. It also looks to sell a 400,000-square-foot complex in Longmont, Colorado.
The Fremont campus, just off Interstate 880, was built in 2010 for $300 million and once served as a Solyndra factory for solar arrays. Seagate paid $90.3 million for it in 2013 after Solyndra declared bankruptcy in 2011.
Seagate is seeking $300 million for the two-story campus — which sits on 31 acres, including 11 yet to be developed — according to unidentified Business Times sources familiar with the listing.
In 2016, Seagate transformed the Fremont campus with a $200 million renovation, according to the marketing brochure. The property achieved LEED Gold status and features a “combination of high-quality clean rooms, laboratories, first-class office space, heavy power and robust MEP infrastructure.”
The property became a symbol in the debate over President Barack Obama’s energy and spending policies when Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney held a roadside news conference in 2012 in front of the Solyndra campus.
Seagate has been consolidating its Bay Area properties since before the pandemic, according to the Business Times. In 2017, it ended a decades-long presence in Scotts Valley and in 2019 it sold a 140,000-square-foot office building in Cupertino.
The firm said it will complete layoffs driven by a slowing demand for hard drives by next summer and that “management will continue to evaluate our global footprint and cost structure, and additional restructuring plans are expected to be formalized,” an October regulatory filing said.
— Dana Bartholomew
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