Industry News

Lucasfilm is developing the $300-million Letterman Digital Arts Center at the Presidio in San Francisco . Housing Industrial Light & Magic, LucasArts, and Lucas Online , the 23-acre site will accommodate 865,000 sf of office space in four buildings upon completion, including the renovated Letterman hospital.

The de Young Museum is constructing a new $200-million privately funded museum and educational tower in San Francisco ’s Golden Gate Park . The 293,000-sf facility more than doubles the footprint of the previous museum, which was damaged in the 1989 earthquake. Construction began in July 2002, with completion expected in January 2005. The museum, which will be connected to the new $370-million California Academy of Sciences facility by an 800-space parking garage, will open in early fall 2005.

St. Louis-based BJC HealthCare is building Progress West Healthcare Center in O’Fallon, Mo. The $75-million, 72-bed hospital will employ 300 health-care professionals when it opens in early 2006.

ABC Group, a manufacturer of automotive systems and components, will invest $19 million to open a new 140,000-sf manufacturing facility in London , Ky.

Electron microscope maker FEI Corp. has opened its enhanced Eindhoven , Netherlands, campus, featuring the “NanoPort," a state-of-the-art product and applications center. Providing space for collaborative R&D projects, such as the European Union’s Interaction Proteome Project, the NanoPort accommodates scientists working in the disciplines of biotechnology, materials science, structural biology, proteomics, pathology, and semiconductors and data storage. The facility houses a range of transmission and scanning electron microscopes, as well as ion beam and dual-beam systems.