Larger Biotech Site Sought at CSUN
Faced with the rapid growth of his Sylmar-based business, entrepreneur Alfred Mann is hoping to expand the amount of land at Cal State Northridge that will be made available to house his $85-million biotech complex.
Mann, chairman and CEO of MiniMed, said Monday that his company is growing so fast that he may need 4 additional acres beyond the 36 already committed to the project or available under option.
If approved, the deal would reduce by four acres the amount of land that Thomas McCarron has to worry about.
McCarron, 45, a 1977 CSUN graduate and chief financial officer of the Cal State University Institute, has been tapped to head up the North Campus-University Park Development Corp., the CSUN auxiliary organization charged with trying to find the best use for the 65-acre rectangle known as the North Campus.
Mann said that initially he had planned to build only two of the project’s five buildings in Phase 1, for a total of 205,000 square feet. Now, he said, plans call for Phase 1 construction of four of the five buildings, at 510,000 square feet.
“We’ll need more than the eight acres we have” under option, said Mann, whose firm makes advanced diabetes treatment systems. “We’ll need 12 instead of the eight.
“We’re growing a lot faster than we thought.”
Mann’s company posted a nearly 40% increase in net sales in the quarter that ended Oct. 2, compared with the same quarter the year before.
“We now rent space all over the place. Trying to keep up with it is not very efficient,” he said.
Mann, who is still arranging financing for the accelerated construction plans, said he has mentioned the additional need to university officials but has yet to discuss the matter in detail.
Over the years, CSUN and its neighbors have been unable to agree on whether the North Campus, bordered by Devonshire and Lassen streets and Lindley and Zelzah avenues, should be used to house a hotel, shopping center, transportation hub or expanded football stadium.
In an interview Sunday, McCarron, who will also serve as executive director of the University Corp., said he isn’t sure how the land should be developed, but he’s convinced that it’s underutilized now.
Calling MiniMed a “wonderful beginning,” McCarron said the university is “hoping to put more energy into developing the area.”
CSUN President Blenda J. Wilson has said she’d like to forge ties with firms in the entertainment community in much the same way that the university worked out a deal with MiniMed for the biotech complex.
Groundbreaking for the complex may be held as early as January.
McCarron said there was some discussion of using the land for sound stages but that talk has faded.
“As far as entertainment, nothing has been finalized,” said McCarron, who starts his new job Jan. 4. “I don’t think there are even any negotiations.”
The land, once the site of horse racing at Devonshire Downs, houses the North Library Annex, the existing 7,500-seat football stadium and the federally subsidized University Village Apartments.
McCarron said the university will seek plans that promote a strong public-private partnership, provide a steady income stream to CSUN while posing little or no risk, and that can serve as an economic stimulus to the San Fernando Valley.
McCarron noted that the MiniMed project is expected to generate more than $30 million in rents over the life of the 42-year lease.
“But I don’t want [revenue] to be the only driver,” he said.
