Wireless phone giant Nokia might have raised some eyebrows last October when it moved its local operations from "Telecom Valley" hotbed Sorrento Mesa east to new digs just off Interstate 15 in the Scripps Northridge Corporate Center, but it only helped to raise the profile of the so-called I-15 Corridor as a major player in San Diego’s new economy. The Nokia Product Creation Center has joined companies locating along Interstate 15. (photo/Lenska Aerial Images) It’s a long way from the cow pastures that dominated the scene 30 years ago — and local land owners, commercial real estate brokers and many of the world's biggest companies couldn’t be happier. Nightmarish traffic jams notwithstanding, it suddenly dawned on Tim Moore recently just how far removed the I-15 Corridor now stands from its bucolic past. Meeting with a developer over aerial photographs of the area, the regional leasing manager for Arden Realty saw how development sprawling east from I-5 nearly backs up to construction heading the other way from I-15. "I was a little surprised at how close," Moore recalls. "A lot of it’s because of Del Mar Heights getting so developed. But when I looked at this map, I thought, 'Wow, suddenly the 15 is not this remote countryside highway. It’s very much linked to what’s happening along the northern coastal area.'" With major corporations like Sony, Intel, SAIC, Siemens and the like snapping up freeway-frontage office space as fast as it pops up on the radar, available land — particularly parcels greater than 10 acres — comes at a premium, not only in established I-15 hot commercial spots like Rancho Bernardo and Scripps Ranch, but in the burgeoning communities of Sabre Springs and Carmel Mountain Ranch. Even the city of Poway, once known primarily for its tidy neighborhoods, good schools and annual rodeo, is gaining a windfall of corporate spillover, as is to a lesser extent Escondido to the north. "What’s happening along the 15 corridor is really reflective of what’s happening in the other technology markets in the county where you see strong desirability," says Dave Marino, executive vice president and principal with Irving Hughes, San Diego’s top tenant representation firm. "We’re also seeing companies that truly don’t want to leave the 15 Corridor and go south into Sorrento Mesa or Kearny Mesa because of the extensive traffic that really backs up south of Ted Williams Parkway and the tough commute then going back in the evening." Add to that the leveling of rental rates in those areas in recent months, and it makes even more sense to stay and grow along the I-15, Marino says. So it’s no wonder that a growing company like NeoPoint, the wireless phone makers now operating out of the UTC area, will soon be heading east to a new 103,000-square-foot campus at Kilroy Realty Corp.'s Innovation Corporate Center (formerly known as the Carmel Mountain Technology Center) on property Kilroy purchased from TRW Inc. in January. Kilroy plans to develop 450,000 square feet of corporate offices and R&D space at the center by the year 2003, cementing its image as a prime-choice site along I-15. Steve Scott, senior vice president in charge of Kilroy's local operations, gets giddy just thinking about it. "North San Diego is exploding with unprecedented activity. Literally there is zero vacancy among the eight million square feet of two-story corporate office space in the area, indicating an incredible demand for low-rise, campus-style developments that suit the high technology and knowledge-based companies flooding the region." Consider some of the most recent notable deals along I-15: In addition to Nokia's Product Creation Center, Home Depot subsidiary Maintenance Warehouse will soon be relocating from Sorrento Mesa to a new 151,400-square-foot headquarters in Scripps Ranch. Computer-chip Goliath Intel, which last year acquired two local e-commerce companies, XLNT Inc. and IPivot of Poway, has leased 61,000 square feet overlooking the freeway in Sabre Springs. Last July, Hitachi Data Systems, which has had a Scripps Ranch Business Park address since 1992, extended its lease another 10 years on nearly 70,000 square feet. "San Diego is a good place for us to do business," notes Karen Kenney, the unit’s director of corporate real estate. "It has a skilled labor force, good transportation connections, fine educational facilities, and our employees like to live here. Overall, the decision to stay right where we are was a relatively easy one for us to make." Sony, apparently not content with the freeway visibility of its 94-acre research campus just west of the I-15 in Rancho Bernardo, is said to be moving ahead with its expansion into one of the two most visible office towers along I-15, in Legacy Partners' project called The Point. Jeb Bakke, first v.p. with CB Richard Ellis, says Sony signed a lease for 93,000 square feet after rejecting sites at Eastgate and Sorrento Mesa. "That will give them tremendous visibility right on Interstate 15," Bakke notes. Sony's corporate neighbors there will include Siemens and SAIC. Just how tough is it to get into Legacy's new towers? "We had 10 offers on one space," Bakke says. "That's not normal. It was not something I had ever been through in my 16 years in real estate." Koll Development will soon break ground on a series of new office buildings in Sabre Springs, while another developer, Newport National, locked up some land behind the Hitachi campus for yet more two-story office/R&D structures. Poway is also seeing its share of corporate interest. ResMed Corp., the world's No. 2 producer of medical equipment to treat breathing-related sleep disorders (a problem that strikes about 10 percent of the adult U.S. population), will relocate next month from tight quarters on Carroll Canyon Road in Scripps Ranch to more than three times the space at Parkway Centre Three in Poway. ResMed, which last month got a nod from Forbes magazine as one of San Diego’s fast-growing companies, signed a 10-year lease for the 130,000-square-foot building. "It’s a hell of a lot of office space and a hell of a lot of warehouse space," says a bemused Walter Flicker, ResMed's corporate secretary, a title straight out of the 11-year-old company’s Australian roots. "No doubt we’re making a big commitment to growing our business here in San Diego, and we’re looking at taking an option on the plot of land next door." Dave Caswell, vice president of technology for another Poway-based company, GeoPerception Inc., which among other things is attempting to perfect the wearable computer system (complete with 1 and a half-inch monitor that drops down in front of your eye) and speed up Internet transactions, admits Poway may be thought of primarily as a warehouse/industrial mecca, but his employees like the place. "The main reason we’re here is because it’s sort of convenient for everybody," Caswell explains. And just how convenient? Well, come Christmastime, the company will be moving out of its tiny headquarters to a 30,000-square-foot office building across the street.

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