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Agilent Technologies considers options for massive complex
1/14/2009 11:43:13 AM
By Hope Brumbach
Splash Editor
After announcing another round of local layoffs last month, Agilent Technologies Inc. is looking at options for its massive industrial building in Liberty Lake.
The complex along Mission Avenue and Molter Road features a more than 200,000-square-foot main building, a conference center, cafeteria, sports fields and surrounding grounds. Agilent is considering selling the facility outright, selling it with an option to lease back a portion or sub-leasing space to other tenants, said human resources manager Fred Krassowski.
"We're at the very earliest stages of pursuing those options," Krassowski said last week, adding that the company could decide to keep the facility in its current use. "At this point, there has been no decision relative to the physical site."
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based high-tech firm has attempted to find tenants during the past year, Krassowski said. The Liberty Lake operation, at 24001 E. Mission Ave., does research and development for the company's test and measurement products.
Over the past several years, the company has announced numerous personnel cuts, including 75 workers in 2007 and 530 in 2001. At the end of the current layoffs, fewer than 100 workers will remain at the Liberty Lake branch, according to the company.
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In its heyday in the mid-1990s, the Liberty Lake site employed up to 1,800, including temporary and full-time employees, Krassowski said. The company's decline "mirrors what we see in manufacturing in the U.S.," he said, with the worsening global economy, tough competition and overseas production.
The current layoffs - around 110 to 120 people - won't shake out until fall, Krassowski said. Initial layoffs will start at the end of January, but many employees will finish up projects before leaving by the end of the company's fiscal year, in October, he said. The Liberty Lake branch, which now employs about 220, also plans to move about 20 employees to California, Krassowski said.
Laid-off employees will receive a highly competitive severance package, according to the company.
Originally part of the tech company Hewlett Packard, the Liberty Lake plant became part of Agilent Technologies in 1999. HP occupied the building starting in the early 1980s, Krassowski said.
As the staff size dwindled at the company in the last few years, the company has moved to lease or sell the space. In 2003, the company announced plans to sell the building and lease it back to save money, but dropped the plans shortly afterward, according to news reports at the time.
In 2006, Agilent underwent a renovation to the two-story main structure to help divide up the space for potential tenants, according to news reports and city records.
"Since we've had a much smaller footprint in Spokane, we have looked at options for how to deal with this site periodically," Krassowski said. "This is another one of those opportunities to decide what would be the right option going forward."
At one time, the site was a source of speculation for city officials, who discussed using it as a high school when a grass roots movement was pushing for a local school district, said Doug Smith, the city's planning and community development director. But that never went farther than an "internal brainstorm session," he said.
The city has eyed the sports fields and tennis courts - which Liberty Lake has a shortage of - but the company's security measures don't allow for public use, Smith said.
"I can't see where the city would have a position at Agilent," he said. "We certainly would assist any business opportunity who has an interest in moving in."
If the Agilent building is sold, the new tenant would be a niche company, said Dave Paperd, a designated broker with The Green Ridge Fund Inc., who is not involved in the building's possible sale.
"That's a one-of-a-kind property. It's a very exclusive company that will want it," Paperd said.
But whatever happens, it likely won't be a quick move, Paperd said.
In today's economic climate, the demand for industrial space and especially office space tends to decrease, Paperd said.
Still, the local market has yet to experience the same decline as the national level, said Mike Livingston, who specializes in office leasing and sales in the brokerage division of Spokane's Kiemle & Hagood Company.
Check out the Liberty Lake Splash blog for a circa-1981 photo of Hewlett Packard, now Agilent Technologies, when it was in the middle of undeveloped fields.