A team from Newmark Grubb Knight Frank (NGKF) has been lauded for its Connecticute leasing efforts.
The company announced that Frontier Communications Corporation’s relocation of its 84,505 s/f headquarters to Norwalk, Connecticut was recognized as the 2015 Lease of the Year by the NAIOP chapter of Connecticut and Suburban New York.
NGKF’s executive managing director Matt Leon, executive vice president and managing director James Ritman, chairman Michael Ippolito and senior managing director Jesse Weber represented Frontier in this significant transaction.
The relocation of Frontier’s headquarters was the largest headquarters relocation in Fairfield County in 2015.
“Finding a location that was efficient, convenient and fiscally effective, along with offering an attractive amenity package for its employees, was paramount for the company,” said Leon, NGKF’s national liaison for Frontier.
The NGKF team conducted an investigation of the market along with an employee computation study, identifying a space within Merritt 7’s Corporate Park as the ideal location.
The transaction allowed Frontier to comfortably house more personnel within a smaller footprint than it had at its former northern Stamford headquarters location and also helped usher in Dan McCarthy as the tenant’s new President and Chief Executive Officer in April 2015.
“We are pleased that our corporate headquarters relocation from Stamford to Norwalk allowed us to maintain our commitment to Connecticut and, in particular, lower Fairfield County,” said Mark Nielsen, Frontier’s senior vice president, general counsel and secretary.
Frontier accepted the award at NAIOP’s Night of the Stars Gala held at l’escale in Greenwich.
This is the second year in a row that a NGKF deal has been honored with NAIOP’s Connecticut Lease of the Year award.
Last year, NGKF’s transaction for vineyard vines’ headquarters relocation to 91,040 s/f at 181 Harbor Drive in Stamford was recognized.
NGKF was also the force behind HomeServe USA’s 47,000 s/f headquarters relocation which was one of three finalists for the Lease of the Year award in 2013.
Additionally, NGKF Research Manager Karolina Pardo-Alexandre was one of three finalists for the 2015 NAIOP Developing Leaders Award.
“We are truly honored to have played a role in the headquarters relocation for Frontier and are thrilled for the company to receive such a prestigious award,” said Ritman.
“Being involved in another NAIOP commended transaction speaks volumes about our presence in the Fairfield County market and reinforces our dedication to NGKF’s national platform.”
