Kylli Advances 1,800-Unit Urban Village in Santa Clara

Kylli has moved forward with plans to build a 49-acre urban village in Santa Clara on a site once slated for a Yahoo office campus.

The San Francisco unit of China-based Genzon Group won key approvals from the Santa Clara City Council for its Mission Point development at 3005 Democracy Way, the Silicon Valley Business Journal reported. It would replace some single-story offices and parking lots.

The council approved the project’s environmental impact report, general plan amendment, rezoning, tentative map and development agreement.

The project, years in the making, calls for up to 1,800 homes, 3 million square feet of office and research labs, 100,000 square feet of shops and restaurants, 10,000 square feet of childcare facilities and 25 acres of parks and open space.

Of its 1,800 homes, 270 would be set aside as affordable. The proposal includes an option to reduce the offices to 2.2 million square feet and add 800 more homes.

The project, to be built in phases, could take 10 years to complete.

Kylli is still looking at years of furthering plans and designs, along with securing additional approvals from the city, according to the Business Journal. The site now provides parking for nearby Levi’s Stadium.

More than a decade ago, the 49-acre property was poised to become a Yahoo campus, with 13 office buildings. In 2015, Sunnyvale-based Yahoo killed the project and sold the property to Chinese tech company LeEco, which fell into disarray.

Kylli, an American subsidiary of the Shenzhen-based pharmaceutical and real estate firm Genzon, bought the project site zoned for 4.4 million square feet of offices in 2017 for an undisclosed price.

In 2022, the developer overhauled its plans for Mission Point, which once called for 600-foot, 6,000-unit residential towers and 3.5 million square feet of offices. It scaled back plans, with a current limit of 19 stories, after the FAA expressed concerns about potential radar interference from the buildings.

Kylli, founded in 2013, has more than $1.6 billion in assets under management in California, which include more than 500,000 square feet of offices in San Francisco, 800,000 square feet of offices under construction in Burlingame and more than 48 acres of land in Santa Clara, according to its LinkedIn page.

— Dana Bartholomew