Erik's DeliCafe Moving HQ to San Jose!

Erik's has always been one of my favorite chain deli's. I don't know if its the sprouts or the mason jars, but there is something about this place that seems to have more character than you typical sandwich shop (especially in their Downtown San Jose location with historic photos plastered all over the walls). The company was founded in 1973 in Scotts Valley and now has over 30 locations. Wanting to get closer to where the action is and scale up, they have decided to move over the hill to The Alameda right outside Downtown San Jose.

By moving their HQ to San Jose, they believe it will be easier to attract potential franchisees. They are also looking for corporate locations, very similar to what Specialties has been doing. Also in the plans is to remodel many of their stores with more modern interiors, support in the kitchen for panini sandwiches, and at the front of the house online ordering.

I think Erik's DeliCafe is a welcome addition to San Jose and I hope they find all of the success they are looking for.

Source: SVBJ

Another San Jose IPO: A10 Networks

We have another public company in the area! Last week A10 Networks had their Initial Public Offering (IPO) and raised $187 million. A10 sells hardware that speeds up the delivery of web applications as well as manage bandwidth and network identity. The money will be used to build up the company's engineering, sales, and marketing departments. If you are looking for a tech job, now may be a good time to head over to the A10 website.

A10's corporate headquarters is located a 3 West Plumeria Drive in North San Jose.

Source: SVBJ

Electric Cloud Moving to Downtown San Jose!

Another hot tech company has decided to move Downtown, and they are taking over a very important building that has been vacant for two years. Electric Cloud is moving 70 employees from Sunnyvale to 18,600 SQFT at 35 South Market Street. This was formerly Xactly's headquarters (they are still Downtown, just needed more space). This is also one of the oldest buildings in the area, being built in 1889. Electric Cloud is going to turn it into a modern open-office floor plan which will be surrounded by historic character.

This spot is quite important since it sits right in the middle of Downtown and will be across the street from the new One South apartment tower. Activating this block is critical to connecting the islands of retail, residential, and office space.

Electric Cloud specializes in software-delivery optimization, essentially reducing time-to-market for companies to get their software in the hands of customers. They will be a very welcome addition to our city's core, and the employees won't be picketed or harassed like in other places around the bay.

Source: SVBJ, hat tip to Michael McAlister

HGST Expanding Historic South San Jose Campus

Nathan Donato-Weinstein from the Silicon Valley Business Journal nabbed an exclusive on the HGST expansion. This historic campus in South San Jose was birthed by IBM in 1956 and was the location where the "flying disk drive" was invented. Now owned by Western Digital, HGST is going to demolish about a million SQFT of outdated space, rehab the remaining structures, and build two new modern buildings. One will be a 15,000 SQFT R&D space while the other will be a 185,000 SQFT office building.

The new buildings will be relatively tall for these types of campuses. The office building will rise up to six stories and the R&D space will probably be four. The architect says there is interest in doing more than "just retaining a manufacturing-style, low-rise model." It sounds like they want to enhance the aesthetics of the overall neighborhood, which is a nice change of pace for these types of projects. I'll look forward to the first set of renders.

Next to the HGST campus, several housing projects are under construction with hundreds (if not thousands) of homes. A new retail center anchored by Target is also in the works, and the area does have access to both Light Rail and Caltrain.

Source: SVBJ

Hoopla Raises $8M, Plans to Expand Downtown San Jose Office!

Another hot startup is expanding in San Jose. Hoopla is a cloud-based gamification solution for motivating sales teams. Basically, they improve sales by throwing an element of fun and competition into the selling process. Gamification is a super hot space right now and Hoopla has grown by 250% last year alone, adding over 150 customers.

By raising $8M in a Series B round, they will be able to double their 25 person company by the end of the year. This also means quadrupling their space in Downtown San Jose. They are currently headquartered at 84 West Santa Clara, Suite 750--right across the street from the new One South tower.

For more information, have a look at the full release below or visit Hoopla's website.

Hoopla Raises $8 Million to Meet Demand for Sales Motivation Software

Series B Round Led by Trinity Ventures to Fund SaaS Company’s Rapid Growth

SAN JOSE, Calif., February 13, 2014—Hoopla, an award-winning provider of sales motivation software, today announced $8 million in Series B funding. The round was led by Trinity Ventures, with participation from previous investors Safeguard Scientifics (NYSE:SFE), Illuminate Ventures and additional private investors. Larry Orr, general partner at Trinity, will join Hoopla’s board of directors.

Founded in 2010, Hoopla’s cloud-based Sales Motivation Platform combines modern gamification techniques with powerful data insights designed to motivate and track   sales team performance. The product’s highly engaging, animated updates are broadcast live on big-screen TVs and web pages throughout the enterprise. A mobile version will be available later this spring.

“The world of sales is changing dramatically,” said Michael Smalls, founder and CEO of Hoopla. “New business models and technologies are changing how and where we sell, and a new generation of employees is bringing a different set of ideas and expectations to the workplace. Our customers recognize this shift, and are using Hoopla to build engaged, high-energy teams that are reporting gains of 50 percent or more in their key performance metrics.”

Hoopla’s software as a service (SaaS) solution targets the 15 million sales and other business professionals worldwide who use customer relationship management (CRM) systems, and want to improve the productivity and performance of their teams. The company grew over 250 percent in 2013, adding over 150 new customers, including well-known brands such as Act-On Software, Castlight Health, Forrester Research, GM Financial, and The Sacramento Kings.

“There is a select group of software technologies that are redefining how sales organizations connect, communicate and drive performance,” said Mr. Orr. “Hoopla is a leader in this market, and is rapidly establishing itself as the must-have motivation platform for world-class sales organizations.”

Hoopla will use its new funding to expand sales, marketing and product development efforts to meet the rapidly growing demand for its software. The company is hiring aggressively and expects to double its employee base by the end of 2014.

About Hoopla®

Hoopla provides cloud-based software that helps sales organizations inspire and motivate sales team performance. Using Hoopla’s award-winning Sales Motivation Platform, industry leaders like Angie’s List, Box, Experian, Glassdoor, Marketo, Trulia, Xactly and Zillow are building high-performance cultures that deliver dramatic gains in sales productivity and customer satisfaction. Learn more at hoopla.net, on Facebook at facebook.com/hoopla, and on Twitter at @hooplasoftware.

About Trinity Ventures

Trinity Ventures is a top-tier venture capital firm combining business insight, practical expertise and a personal touch to help start-ups win big. For over eleven funds, Trinity has helped passionate entrepreneurs with breakthrough ideas transform markets and lives. Trinity's investment team takes a collaborative approach and believes in personal engagement, mutual respect and goal alignment to deliver out-sized returns to entrepreneurs and investors. The firm invests in early stage technology companies with emphases on Cloud, Digital Media, Social Commerce and Entertainment, and Software as a Service.

Synaptics Expands San Jose Headquarters

Synaptics is one of the market leaders in touch-sensing technology, such as trackpads on laptops. The company moved its headquarters to Northeast San Jose in 2013, and they are already expanding. They just paid $10 million for an extra 80,000 SQFT of space at 1140 and 1150 Ringwood Court. These two buildings are right next to their current three-building campus.

Source: SVBJ

Metro Moves Further into Downtown's SoFA District

Metro Newspapers has purchased a 4,200 SQFT building at 380 S. First St., right in the heart of Downtown San Jose's SoFA district. This is a space that has been vacant for 10 years.

Metro was actually one of the companies that helped make SoFA what it is today (it used to be San Jose's red light district). The area has hit a positive trajectory as of late. Jazz-oriented Cafe Stritch launched last year, Parque De Los Pobladores Park was greatly expanded, work started on the SoFA Market venue which will house multiple small eateries and shops, and a massive residential project called The Pierce is about to break ground (with a great design). I'm looking forward to seeing what SoFA will be like a few years from now.

The New Metro HQ will house 30 staff members and is going to be designed to easily accommodate events and temporary art galleries. Metro does a bit already (they are a First Fridays stop), but this new space will be arranged with that in mind from the beginning.

Source: SVBJ

Virident Moving from Milpitas to San Jose

Virident is a storage company that specializes in flash-based technologies that are used in data centers. They have decided to move their headquarters from a 30,000 SQFT space in Milpitas to 68,000 SQFT at 1745 Technology Drive in San Jose. The building used to be part of the old Brocade campus before they moved to @First.

Virident will bring with it over 100 employees, along with the potential to house nearly 300 in the new space. While the main reason for the move was to have room to expand, I like how a company executive also mentioned it was "closer to amenities employees may be looking for."

Source: SVBJ

Quick Samsung Campus Pic

Downtown isn't the only place in San Jose where multiple cranes are going up. Below is a pic that Jaime Pelayo sent in last week of the Samsung Headquarters in North San Jose. It looks like the flagship campus is now growing above ground. Looking forward to seeing this project at full height!

Edgewater Networks Moves to South San Jose

Edgewater is an internet communications company with various solutions and services. They have been leasing 24,000 SQFT of space at 2895 Northwestern Parkway in Santa Clara for the last five years. The company has decided to upgrade their headquarters to 38,000 SQFT in South San Jose at Hellyer Oaks Technology Park. Low rents and a reverse commute seem to be attracting a little bit more attention to the area (Barracuda Networks made a big move here as well), but office vacancy in South San Jose is still hovering around 20%.

Source: SVBJ

Apigee is Moving to Downtown San Jose!

Apigee is technology start-up that has become a major player in enterprise API (Application Programming Interface) management. APIs let companies open up their software so that other applications can communicate with them. Whenever you see a function on a website that lets you post to Facebook, Google+, Linkedin, or Twitter... that is all done using APIs.

Now to cut to the chase, Apigee is a hot Palo Alto company with IPO potential and they have decided to move to Downtown San Jose. They are upgrading from 16,000 SQFT at 260 Sheridan to 41,000 SQFT of office space that could house over 250 employees at 10 Almaden. This is the largest office lease for Downtown so far in 2013.

What is surprising is that 20% of Apigee workers live in San Francisco and take Caltrain to work. They found that most San Franciscans actually preferred the Downtown San Jose location since they can take a baby bullet train which does not service the California Avenue Caltrain stop. Hopefully, if Downtown continues on the current trajectory, we might be able to convert some of these San Franciscans to San Joseans.

Some other perks of moving to Downtown San Jose from Palo Alto is that the cost of the office space is far less expensive and there is plenty of room to grow. You also have access easy access to the SAP Center, the remodeled Convention Center, an international airport, Lightrail, and BART in the future. If we can get two or three more of these hot companies Downtown, I think it would have a strong positive impact on the brand of Downtown and put the area on the radar for a lot more hot growing companies in Silicon Valley. Already, the restaurant and residential markets are exploding and retail is improving at a steady pace, so it is just a matter of time before the office market catches up.

Source: SVBJ

Fair Isaac Corp (FICO) is Moving HQ to San Jose

It sounds like yet another major company has decided to make San Jose its home. Fair Isaac, the company behind your FICO score, is moving their HQ from Minneapolis to offices in San Jose near SJC where they already have 90 employees. They have just signed a lease for an additional floor and do plan to increase their headcount with a focus on technology and big data--which is one of the main reasons for the relocation. The talent pool for engineers in Silicon Valley in unsurpassed, making San Jose a logical choice for their headquarters.

Source: SVBJ

Samsung Expanding New San Jose HQ to 1,100,000 SQFT?

Unless there is a typo in Samsung's press release below, it sounds like they have expanded their plans for a flagship campus in North San Jose! Instead of clocking in at 650,000 sqft, they are now aiming for over a million square feet. I'm not sure if all of that will arrive in the first phase or if they are planning to do another building in the future, but reading this sure was a nice surprise today.

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SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media, digital convergence technologies and advanced semiconductor solutions, continues to expand its operations in Silicon Valley by investing more resources in its existing R&D centers and establishing new innovation centers.

Samsung Semiconductor, Inc. (SSI) announced plans to build a 1.1 million square foot sales and R&D headquarters on the current site of its semiconductor and display panel businesses, north of downtown San Jose. The building, designed by global architecture firm NBBJ, will be comprised of a 10-story tower, an amenity pavilion and parking garage. The design seeks to encourage interaction among staff, foster connections with the community and provide a space to attract employment in the highly competitive tech market, which is growing at a faster pace than overall employment.

Source: Engadget

Samsung's New San Jose HQ Shoots for the Moon!

Right now there is a lot of good news circulating related to San Jose development, but once and a while I still find a real gem that surprises and excites me, and this is one of them. While Samsung is based in Korea, their subsidiary Samsung Semiconductor is headquartered right here in San Jose. They have decided to tear down their mostly 2 story campus, and build something larger in order to expand their headcount and presence in San jose. I knew there would be two 10 story towers totaling about 650,000 sqft, but I was expecting a pretty standard box like most buildings in the golden triangle (area bound by 101, 880, and 237). Instead, Samsung designed something that simply does not exist in Silicon Valley right now, a truly iconic office building.

It purposefully looks different and will raise eyebrows as people drive down North First or Tasman. There are at least two large outdoor spaces between the three 2-story pieces that protrude from the building. However, the really interesting element is a hollowed out core! There is a substantial courtyard in the middle of at least one of the buildings, complete with terraces of its own.

From the renderings it looks like there is a camouflaged parking structure topped with solar panels and an asymmetrical five-point building as well. I'm not sure where the second tower is going to be but I imagine it will be similar to the first. Lightrail is also across the street, the 49ers stadium and the Santa Clara Convention Center are down the street, and there are thousands of dense new homes being built in walking distance.

This building in and of itself is enough to get excited about, but I'm also stoked about the implications. Samsung is setting a new bar for office developments in North San Jose. This is going to stand out like crazy, so you can bet that future developments are more likely to be radical designs to compete with this building instead of being the same boring 2-5 story buildings the area is used to. More iconic and unique buildings means a stronger identity for San Jose and Silicon Valley as a whole. The only other company taking big risks with office design right now is Apple, with quite an impressive design of their own. Hopefully these two will encourage other companies to step it up and build something to be proud of.

Source: SJBJ

A10 Networks Has a New San Jose HQ

A10 Networks is an application networking company that was recently named the 2nd fastest-growing private company in Silicon Valley. They have just moved into a new North San Jose Headquarters at 3 W. Plumeria Drive. The office is 79,800 sqft--double the size of their previous home--and with the new space comes additional headcount. They are planning to hire over 100 new workers over the next year. It's always great news to hear about additional workers in San Jose, especially denser areas with transit like North San Jose.

Source: SJBJ

Valin Moves HQ from Sunnyvale to San Jose

Valin is a process solutions company whose light manufacturing business is growing and they are in need of more space. They are going from 32,000 sqft on 555 E. California to 56,840 sqft in San Jose's International Business Park (1941 Ringwood).

Valin has revenues of $153 million and has grown its workforce from 150 employees in 2008 to 237 employees today.

Source: SJBJ

LSI and Advantest Bringing Headquarters to SJ

San Jose is gaining 336,000 sqft of office space along with 1,250 jobs thanks to the relocation of two corporate headquarters. LSI is moving 850 employees from 3 Milpitas offices into a single 220,591 sqft building in North San Jose. The target for the move is Q1 2013 and the plan includes adding 25,000 sqft of additional space in the future.

Advantest is bringing 400 workers to a 116,000 sqft building on Zanker from current locations in Santa Clara and Cupertino. This move is happening right now.

Source: SJBJ

SunWize Moves Headquarters to San Jose

Yet another company is moving to San Jose! SunWize specializes in solar energy solutions for various applications and fits in nicely with San Jose's long term "green vision." They primarily do residential, commercial, and industrial solar installations.

SunWize is moving from Kingston, NY and is a subsidiary of Mitsui.

For more information click here.

SolFocus is Moving Headquarters from Mountain View to San Jose

SolFocus, a venture-backed manufacturer of solar energy systems, is moving their headquarters from Mountain View to San Jose at the corner of Brokaw and Zanker. This is just another in a series of moves that will help San Jose become the green-tech capital of the world. Source: SJBJ

A Peek at Brocade's New San Jose Headquarters

Below is a quick 6min video talking about the Brocade campus that now anchor's San Jose's @First development. It's always nice to see another world class HQ open up here. Brocade will join Cisco, eBay, Adobe, Cadence, and many others with flagship offices in San Jose.