Ellis Partners, Baupost Group Spend $310M For Santa Clara Office
Ellis Partners continued its South Bay spending spree with the acquisition of two six-story, Class-A office and research and development buildings in Santa Clara.
Ellis Partners and hedge fund The Baupost Group of Boston purchased the 635K SF Great American Commons at 4555 and 4655 Great America Parkway for $310M in the largest office transaction of the year in Silicon Valley, The Mercury News reported.
Great America Commons is 77% leased, with a tenant roster that includes Ampere Computing and Texas Instruments as well as the headquarters offices for the San Francisco 49ers. PGIM, the global asset management arm of Prudential Financial, was the seller.
The only deal this year in the greater Bay Area larger than the acquisition of the Santa Clara office complex is the $691M purchase of the Transamerica Pyramid in April by Yoda PLC of Cypress.
Recent capital improvements to Great America Commons, built in 2002, include renovated lobbies and Harvest Hall, a 1.4-megawatt, net-zero solar power amenity building with a full-service cafe, an entertainment courtyard and an outdoor theater.
The complex also has more than 2.5 acres of outdoor space labeled The Meadow, which features a game lawn and putting green, volleyball and basketball courts, and a fitness center.
Ellis Partners and The Baupost Group obtained $232.1M in acquisition financing from Apollo Global Funding and Athene Annuity & Life, entities located in the Cayman Islands, The Mercury News reported.
It’s the second major joint office/R&D acquisition for Ellis Partners and The Baupost Group in the past eight months. In September 2025, the companies purchased Campus at Scott, a three-building, Class-A office complex totaling 460K SF on Scott Boulevard in Santa Clara.
The assets traded hands for $210M, with Newmark’s Ramsey Daya, Chris Moritz and Connor Stapleton arranging $167.1M in acquisition financing.
Clarion Partners acquired Campus at Scott in 2015 for $305M but took a $95M hit on its purchase. Earlier this month, cybersecurity firm Ilumio announced it would relocate its corporate headquarters from Sunnyvale to 120K SF of office space at Campus at Scott.
Silicon Valley office vacancy continues to compress, ending Q1 at just under 19%, Cushman & Wakefield reported. In the same quarter a year earlier, South Bay office vacancy was 20%.
However, overall asking rents are flagging at $5.15 per SF, a 30-cent drop from the prior quarter. Santa Clara and Sunnyvale outperformed the rest of the market with 321K SF of positive net absorption in Q1.
