DAVAO CITY — The Floirendo-owned Damosa Land Inc. (DLI) is constructing a third building within the Damosa IT Park in the central-western side of Davao City and is now in talks with locators.

DLI Vice-president Ricardo F. Lagdameo, in an interview with BusinessWorld, said groundbreaking for the 15-storey Davao Diamond Tower is being planned before the end of November and the target completion date is early 2020.

“We are talking to a few locators already, meaning we already showed them the project. These are the people we have been talking to for quite sometime already and these are people that have office space already with us and need to expand,” Mr. Lagdameo said.

The new building will have a total floor area of 20,000 square meters (sq.m.).

Among the current locators at the Damosa IT Park, a Philippine Economic Zone Authority-accredited facility, are global office space provider Regus, business process outsourcing (BPO) firm Concentrix and various information technology companies.

Mr. Lagdameo said about 90% of their locators are not from Davao City.

“But it is not only BPO inside Damosa IT Park, I would say 50/50, 50% is BPO the other 50% are traditional offices, accounting offices, shipping lines, and the Regus business center,” he said.

Mr. Lagdameo said among those they are talking to for the new tower are some of the Regus clients who are now planning to set up a permanent office in the city.

At the same time, he said they are considering opening another Regus center at the Davao Diamond Tower.

The 1,600-sq.m. Regus Davao center, currently 100% occupied, was opened in September 2016. It has 346 stations, 52 offices, and three conference rooms.

Regus, meanwhile, is opening another Davao branch at the Felcris Centrale BPO building, located at the central-south part of the city.

“We are opening at Felcris Centrale on December 1,” Regus Davao General Manager Cherrilyn Casuga said during the Energy Smart Mindanao 2018 forum organized by the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines last Nov. 22. The Damosa IT Park is located within the Damosa District, one of the first mixed-use complexes in Mindanao. It houses the headquarters of the Floirendo’s holding firm Anflo Management and Investment Corp., the Damosa Gateway with dining places and retail shops, Damosa Market Basket, and Damosa Business Center. — with a report fromMarifi S. Jara

This article was originally published in Business World last November 27, 2018.