SUNNYVALE — Walmart’s digital unit has struck a deal to sublease a huge tech campus in Sunnyvale in a deal that could potentially provide a big-time boost to a wobbly Silicon Valley office market.
In 2021, Facebook app owner Meta Platforms leased the entire campus. At the time, the huge rental deal represented a major expansion for the tech titan. Not long after that mega leasing deal, Meta drastically shifted its real estate priorities. The diminished demand, in turn, prodded tech companies to chop jobs worldwide as well as in the Bay Area — staffing reductions that also drastically curtailed the need by tech companies for office space. Vacancies rocketed higher as tech company office footprints shrank.
That price represented a huge increase in value for the tech campus, which Tishman Speyer bought in 2021 from tech company NetApp for $365 million at a time when the property was empty.