Oct 13, 2022

F5

Budnik

F5 appointed Marianne Budnik to its board of directors. Budnik has extensive marketing and cybersecurity expertise, as well as more than 25 years of operating experience in the technology sector. Budnik currently serves as chief marketing officer for Talon Cyber Security. Previously, she served as chief marketing officer for CrowdStrike, where she also oversaw the company's diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. Budnik's prior roles include chief marketing officer for CyberArk, as well as leadership roles with SimpliVity, Acme Packet, CA Technologies, and EMC Corp. Budnik earned an M.B.A. from Boston University and currently serves on the board of directors for Cerence, Inc. With Budnik's appointment, F5's board expands to 12 members, 11 of whom are independent. Headquartered in Seattle, F5 is a multi-cloud application services and security company.

Wizards remains in Renton

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Several recent office reports from various brokers agree that Wizards of the Coast is moving its headquarters in Renton, where the game company was founded 32 years ago. It has leased 110,947 square feet at Southport, representing the biggest tenant signed there to date. Landlord Seco Development confirmed the lease last month with Puget Sound Business Journal; CBRE brokers the space for Seco. Wizard's many popular titles include Dungeons & Dragons and Magic, the Gathering. Its currently based in the old Landmark office park a little south of Interstate 405. Based on that old lease, it may be shedding a little space, but it also has 28,000 square feet in Bellevue's Eastgate Office Park.

BH Properties

McLaughlin

BH Properties recently announced that Hughes McLaughlin has joined the firm as managing director. He'll be tasked with leading acquisitions in the Pacific Northwest, with an emphasis on value-add deals and opportunistic real estate. He makes the move from Cushman & Wakefield. He's a 20-year veteran in our market. He said in a statement, “My role is to find fundamentally strong real estate assets that are suffering from today's market dislocation. One of the things that attracted me to BH is that they are self-funded and require little to no leverage to close on even the most complex transactions. This also allows us to deploy capital in scenarios where traditional joint ventures wouldn't.” BH is based in Santa Monica, Calif. and has an office in Seattle. The privately held firm now has about 100 properties under management, which total about 10 million square feet.

Brokers both bearish and bullish?

Beddard

Nov. 16 marks the next NAIOP monthly breakfast, to be held at Hyatt Regency Seattle at 8 a.m. The panel discussion will consist of office brokers trying to forecast a very cloudy 2023 ahead. Interest rates, work-from-home, the ascendancy of industrial and life science, the cratering of office and the durability of apartments will all likely enter into the discussion. Alison Beddard of Cushman & Wakefield will moderate the discussion among CBRE's Laura Ford, Thad Mallory of Newmark and Chris Moe of Kidder Mathews. Details and registration: naiopwa.org.

Orchard sprouts downtown

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As traditional office leases are decreasing in size and duration, hybrid work and co-work spaces are picking up some of the slack. Thus, JLL is expanding its Orchard Workspace by JLL platform, it recently announced. That expansion, marking its second location in the U.S. after Brooklyn, recently opened with 35,000 square feet on two floors at Westlake Tower, at 1601 Fifth Ave., overlooking the monorail. Jacob Bates, the head of Flex by JLL, said in a statement, “We are excited to activate the Seattle location and add the space to JLL's growing network of flex locations around the world. With hybrid work, flex is becoming a significant part of employers' flexible work strategies, and our new Seattle location serves to effectively implement these plans.”

The Beer Institute

Crawford

The Beer Institute, one of the nation's oldest trade associations representing brewers, beer importers and beer industry suppliers, appointed Brian Crawford as president and chief executive officer of the trade association. Crawford joins the Beer Institute from the American Hotel and Lodging Association (AHLA), where he is executive vice president of government affairs. The position of president and chief executive officer has been vacant since May, after the departure of Jim McGreevy. Celebrating its 160th anniversary, Crawford will lead and represent the Beer Institute before lawmakers, regulators, news media and in public forums. Crawford came to AHLA following eight years in the U.S. House of Representatives, having served five as chief of staff to U.S. Congressman Tom Rooney. He previously served as the deputy chief of staff for Florida Congressman Ric Keller, and held senior roles in other national trade associations.

Genuine Auto Glass

Safelite Group, owner of Safelite AutoGlass, announced an agreement to acquire the assets of Genuine Auto Glass in Seattle. Genuine Auto Glass will leverage Safelite's operational systems, safety system recalibration expertise, distribution network, global purchasing power and insurance and commercial relationships. Safelite Group is a vehicle glass and claims management service organization based in Columbus, Ohio, and operates facilities in 50 states. The company, which has been in business since 1947, includes Safelite AutoGlass and Safelite Solutions, which offers fleet and insurance claims management services for vehicle glass and other claims. The company employs over 16,000 people throughout the United States.

Itron

Liberty Lake-based Itron appointed Mary Hemmingsen to its board of directors. Hemmingsen brings more than 30 years of expertise in finance, asset management, project delivery, business development and governance. Since 2017, she has served in a variety of executive advisory roles for energy industry organizations as well as board roles. From 2013 to 2017, Hemmingsen was a global partner and gas, power and utilities industry lead at KPMG. Previously, she held senior executive positions in business and project development within the power and utilities group at Brookfield, a global asset management company, and several executive and corporate finance positions at BC Hydro Power Authority. Itron enables utilities and cities to deliver infrastructure solutions to communities in more than 100 countries.