The new owner of the former Philips Research North America campus in Briarcliff Manor said his New Jersey real estate company will seek the village”™s approval to redevelop the vacant property as a residential community.
Ridgewood Real Estate Partners, based in Florham Park, in June closed on its $12.2 million purchase of the former Philips office and laboratory facility on an approximately 100-acre tract at 345 Scarborough Road. The largely undeveloped campus was occupied for 50 years by the technology research business of Royal Philips N.V., the global technology company headquartered in the Netherlands.
Philips in 2015 closed the site and relocated 125 employees to the technology hub of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Briarcliff Manor facility, where researchers focused on technological innovations for health care systems and lighting and where Philips”™ intellectual property and standards division also was based, at its peak reportedly had 300 employees.
The buyer, Ridgewood Real Estate Partners, was founded in 2008 by Jonathan S. Grebow, its president and CEO and the former president of The Atlantic Cos., a national residential real estate developer. Among its residential and mixed-use property deals in six states, Ridgewood has acquired two golf courses in New Jersey and Pennsylvania with plans to redevelop them as residential communities, according to its website.
Ridgewood also serves as a consultant to Related Cos., the New York City-based developer of Tuxedo Farms, a planned community in Sloatsburg in Rockland County. The Briarcliff Manor property is its first acquisition in Westchester.
In a statement to the Business Journal, Grebow said his company looks forward to working with Briarcliff Manor officials and professional staff “to repurpose the vacant and underutilized former Philips site and to redevelop this property into a thoughtfully designed residential community, including amenities that will benefit the entire village.”
“We also think that this project will address an underserved segment of the Briarcliff and Westchester market,” Grebow said. “With its fantastic views, a great location and a wonderful surrounding community, Ridgewood Real Estate Partners believes this will be an exciting and welcomed project in the village of Briarcliff Manor.”
