SAN BERNARDINO, Calif., Dec. 7, 2004 (PRIMEZONE) -- Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) has announced that it plans to relocate its Missile Engineering Center to a new site located on Hospitality Lane inside the Tri-City Corporate Centre by January 2006.
The company has signed a 10-year lease with Rancon Realty Fund V, a California limited partnership, which owns the Centre. The new building will be managed, leased and developed by Glenborough Realty Trust Incorporated on behalf of Rancon. CB Richard Ellis represented Northrop Grumman in the transaction and Glenborough represented the landlord.
Northrop Grumman will move approximately 225 scientists and engineers into the new three-story, high-tech facility where the company plans to initially occupy 85,000 square feet, with options to grow. A formal groundbreaking ceremony will take place in early 2005.
"Northrop Grumman has been a major player in San Bernardino for more than 42 years where it has drawn upon the best and brightest to address programs of critical importance to our nation's defense," said Burt Yamada, Northrop Grumman's director of the Missile Engineering Center in San Bernardino. "As a vital center for missile technology development, San Bernardino offers Northrop Grumman a wealth of talent for us to grow and continue supporting multiple Northrop Grumman programs."
The Tri-City Corporate Centre incorporates more than 153 acres and is situated at the junction of Interstates 10 and 215. It is a mixed-use development that incorporates every element of a dynamic, state-of-the-art corporate environment for its office and retail space occupants.
"We are pleased at Northrop Grumman's decision to continue its long and distinguished presence here in the San Bernardino area," said U.S. Representative Jerry Lewis, 41st Congressional District, California. "Their commitment to stay is a testimony to our highly skilled aerospace and defense workforce, whose expertise has helped the company tackle programs of national importance in the missile defense and ICBM arena."
Northrop Grumman's Missile Engineering Center, which is part of the company's Mission Systems sector, is currently located on East Harry Sheppard Boulevard.
Northrop Grumman came to San Bernardino in 1962 when the former TRW (acquired by Northrop Grumman in 2002) moved to the area from Los Angeles. The purpose of the move was to co-locate with its customer at Norton Air Force Base to work on the Titan missile and the Minuteman II missile programs. When Norton was closed in 1994, the company temporarily moved off the base while offices were being refurbished by the Inland Valley Development Agency. In February 1996, Northrop Grumman returned to become the first major tenant in the redeveloped former air force base.
Today, the company's Missile Engineering Center is supporting two major government missile programs -- the ICBM Minuteman III modernization program where Northrop Grumman is the prime contractor responsible for maintaining, sustaining, and modernizing the nation's fleet of Minuteman III missiles; and the Kinetic Energy Interceptors program -- a critical boost/ascent-phase missile defense program where Northrop Grumman is the prime contractor developing and testing this capability.
Northrop Grumman Mission Systems, based in Reston, Va., is a global integrator of complex, mission-enabling systems and services for defense, intelligence and civil government markets. The sector's technology leadership and expertise spans areas such as strategic systems, including ICBMs; missile defense; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; command and control; and technical services and training.