Rubenstein Fund II Buys Former Wang Computers' HQ

TEWKSBURY, MA—The $500-million Rubenstein Properties Fund II L.P., a property of Rubenstein Partners, L.P., has acquired 495 Business Center, a four building commercial office park that was formerly the original headquarters of Wang Computers, for $13 million.

The property, which sits on 84 acres in Tewskbury, consists of four conjoined buildings totaling approximately 722,422 rentable square feet at 200, 300, 400 and 500 Network Center Drive. The property is presently multi-tenanted with a mix of uses including office, R&D, laboratory, manufacturing warehouse and flex.

Rubenstein Partners, and its partner Genesis Management Group, intend a significant renovation and repositioning of the property into what they say will be predominantly “creative class” office space, leveraging the asset's physical attributes such as ceiling heights, efficient floor plates and infrastructure.

"Our focus as a firm is on adding value to office assets. Here, we see a great opportunity to enhance value, given the local demand for creative office space on one hand, and the physical attributes of the property given its historic use as R&D and manufacturing space on the other," says David Rubenstein, founder and senior managing partner of Rubenstein Partners.

"It's unusual to find this combination of ceiling heights, open floors, and infrastructure in a multi-story building in this market, and, along with our planned renovations, this will differentiate the property from competing office supply. Through thoughtful redesign and targeted capital investment, we envision a rebirth of the asset into a center for innovation for this century," says Deke Schultze, senior vice president of Rubenstein Partners and head of acquisitions for the New England region.

Paul C. Grant, president and CEO of Genesis, adds that the size and scale of the property has proven to be “particularly attractive to large users that anticipate growth given the expansion opportunities it affords."