A Sunnyvale battery company has landed one of the most sought-after industrial buildings in the South Bay, beating out some of the biggest names in tech for a massive Milpitas warehouse. Antora Energy has leased the 294,000-square-foot building at 475 Sycamore Drive, next to Barber Lane, after the site drew interest from multiple technology firms over the past several months.
The deal closed after Google and Super Micro Computer had both been eyeing the same space, according to sources familiar with the Bay Area property market cited by The Mercury News. A Prologis spokesperson confirmed the space has been leased but declined to discuss specifics of the rental transaction, the outlet reported. Prologis, which the report describes as one of the nation’s largest real estate companies, developed and owns the building, with brokers from Cushman & Wakefield and JLL both working to scout tenants for the property.
A Building Built for Power-Hungry Tenants
Part of what made 475 Sycamore Drive so attractive is its electrical capacity. The building can handle up to 4,000 amps of power and can be expanded to 8,000 amps, according to the same report. Marketing materials also touted parking for 225 employee vehicles, details that were circulating back in September when Google and Super Micro Computer were weighing a rental deal for the then-new building.
That kind of power infrastructure has become a prized commodity in Silicon Valley as data centers and manufacturers compete for a shrinking pool of modern industrial space. Nearby, a Morgan Stanley-managed fund paid $84.1 million in an all-cash deal for a 189,000-square-foot Milpitas research and development facility occupied by KLA, which separately upgraded power capacity at its own 601 McCarthy Boulevard facility to 6,000 amps, according to Bisnow. A separate Prologis campus brochure advertised 10,000 amps available at a different Milpitas site, though it is not clear whether those figures describe the same capacity configuration as the Sycamore Drive building.
What Antora Actually Makes
Antora Energy, based in Sunnyvale, makes what it calls a thermal battery that stores low-cost energy as heat inside insulated solid-carbon blocks. The company says the stored energy can then be delivered as reliable power or heat on a 24/7 basis, charging when electricity is abundant and discharging when it’s needed most. Antora says the system serves chemical plants, food producers, steelmakers, data centers and the electricity grid…