Development firm purchases high-tech Research Park building

Fox-Atkins Development finalized the purchase of Research Park's former Motorola building from Motorola Inc. June 23. The 74,000-square-foot structure is the only building in the park not built by Fox-Atkins or the University of Illinois.

The former Motorola building, located between Oak Street and First Street across from the University's Assembly Hall, was put on the market during the fall of 2007 and about 215 workers lost their jobs.

Fox-Atkins made a formal offer in early 2008 and helped many of those workers find employment, said Laura Frerichs, Fox-Atkins Development's vice president of business development and marketing.

"One of our managers became involved by conducting research on greater firms that wanted to hire Motorola software developers," Frerichs said. "Some of the workers banded together to court large companies as well, and we helped them with meeting space for interviews."

Many of those workers were hired by major companies such as Yahoo and Qualcomm.

Fox-Atkins Development's main goal is to attract other major companies to the Champaign-Urbana and campus area.

They also have hopes to use the building to expand other technology and research firms. Several firms in Research Park, because of limited office space in their units, are also looking to move to the building. However, no tenants have been finalized.

The building boasts the latest standards in lighting, large raised-floor data center rooms, backup generator power, more than a dozen conference rooms and fiber infrastructure; all which appeal to computer workers and technology companies, Frerichs said.

"It's also very contemporary inside, we don't want it to look like every other professional building in Champaign," she said on Tuesday. "It's hip and modern, and companies like that."

The first tenants, Illini Computing, are expected to move into the former Motorola building sometime during the next week. The small firm signed a lease with Fox-Atkins on Monday.