Breinigsville Tek Park Sells for $50 Million

The technology campus at 9999 Hamilton Blvd., once the world headquarters for AT&T Optoelectronics, was sold to a New York-based investment group for $50 million, according to a release from the current owners.

The property sits atop a hill that was once used as a launching pad for hang gliders. The nine building campus was bought by real estate development company MRA Group, of Horsham, Pa., for $9.3 million in 2005. At that time in was mostly vacant had been up for sale for nearly two years.

"We saw something there that others didn't," said Lawrence J. Stuardi, MRA Group CEO. "We approached the project with a sense of frontier spirit and knew we could make it work."

Now, the complex maintains a near 90 percent occupancy rate and more the 600 area residents are employed onsite. CyOptics, Buckeye Pipeline and Aesculup have research facilities on the campus, and Kutztown University has its Innovation Center there.

"To see it become a vibrant collegial village — that is what I would call it, a village — is really incredible," Stuardi said.

The complex has also been designated a Keystone Innovation Zone (KIZ) offering tax incentives and other economic incentives to tenants.

TEK Park was built in 1987 as a Bell Labs research center, according to The Morning Call. When AT&T spun off its telecommunications to Lucent Technologies. Then Agere Systems  inherited it when it spun off from Lucent in 2001.