McDonnell to Start on Plant in Santa Ana

McDonnell Douglas said Tuesday that it plans to begin construction early next year of a 300,000-square-foot, $23-million office and manufacturing facility in Santa Ana as the first phase of a sprawling 52.5-acre office, manufacturing and research “campus” for units of its Information Systems Group.

The initial project, which will house about 850 workers from existing Orange County-based units of McDonnell Douglas Computer Systems Co., is scheduled to be completed in mid-1988, a company spokesman said.

McDonnell Douglas purchased 52.5 acres in Santa Ana last year for a reported $21 million and said at that time that it ultimately will construct a 1.8-million-square-foot, $150-million complex on the site.

The computer systems group is one of four units of the McDonnell Douglas Information Systems Group. A spokesman for the company said Tuesday that the initial facility will be used for computer systems sales, marketing and administrative offices and mini-computer and computer hardware manufacturing operations.

When the entire complex is completed, as many as 4,000 employees from 14 current Information Systems Group facilities in Irvine, Newport Beach and Cypress will be based there, the spokesman said. He said there is no timetable for construction of other parts of the complex, part of a 126-acre industrial park south of Edinger Avenue and west of the Costa Mesa Freeway in Santa Ana.