Still growing: World Wide Technology plans big expansion in the Metro East
Posted by the St. Louis Post-Dispatchon March 19, 2018:
Less than a year after opening a shiny new headquarters facility in Maryland Heights, World Wide Technology is again planning massive expansion, this time in the Metro East.
The technology systems integrator and solutions provider has signed a lease to occupy more than 2 million square feet of industrial space — spread evenly across two buildings — in the Gateway Commerce Center in Edwardsville. Earth City-based TriStar Properties is the developer of the project, which is expected to cost more than $115 million and begin construction before the end of the month.
World Wide Technology already has roughly 1,500 employees working in two industrial facilities totaling 1.6 million square feet in the nearby Lakeview Commerce Center. The company will vacate those buildings, owned separately by Duke Realty and Panattoni Development Co., when TriStar finishes construction of the new buildings in April 2019.
In the new buildings, World Wide Technology will invest more than $100 million over the 10-year term of the lease and add approximately 500 new jobs to the mix over the next few years, said Tom Strunk, the company's chief financial officer.
Similar to what World Wide Technology alreadyhas in Lakeview, the Gateway buildings will house the company's Integration Technology Center— where employees tinker with andbuild applications for customers — and serve as its North American distribution hub.
"We originally thought we'd have enough capacity when we built out our existing facilities, but we've just grown out of that capacity and actually have had to start using other facilities on a temporary basis," said CEO Jim Kavanaugh. "We're also looking at this as an opportunity to add additional capabilities that we just can't do in our current buildings."
The lease is widely considered to be one of — if not the — biggest industrial transaction in St. Louis history. Katie Haywood and Ryan Keiser of CBRE helped broker the deal on behalf of World Wide Technology.
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