In today’s Bulldog Update of technology stories: life science industry fuels hot Triangle real estate market; Startup Grind to host David Garner of Cofounders Capital; NC CEO Forum set for November; Sprint layoffs likely.

Hot life sciences real estate market

The News and Observer reports that growth in the Triangle life sciences market is opening real estate opportunities. The Triangle is already ranked the second-best life sciences real estate market by JLL, behind only Boston.

The Triangle biotechnology hub regularly ranks among the top five nationally and frequently in the top three. It is also a major agbiotech hub. On top of that, the region’s three top research universities offer a talented workforce and a pipeline of life science startups to the mix.

Lower costs is another factor luring life science companies large and small here. The price for space in the Triangle last year was $19, while in Boston it was $47.40 and in San Francisco, $37.40. Even though rents rose 12.4 percent last year in the Triangle, they’re still much cheaper than in many other cities.

The N&O points out that real estate developer Longfellow paid $117.7 million to buy the Keystone Technology Park in Durham, an 11-building site with 806,000 square feet of office and lab space. The company already owns about 250,000 square feet of space within two miles of Keystone.

Longfellow is also developing Durham’s Innovation District, a 15-acre downtown site planned to have more than a million square feet of lab and office space.

For the full N&O story see: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/real-estate-news/article37374069.html#emlnl=morning_newsletter

Startup Grind hosting David Gardner

Startup Grind will host Cofounder Capital’s David Gardner at a Raleigh event Oct. 22.

Gardner is a serial entrepreneur, writer, adviser, and very early-stage investor with nearly thirty years of experience in creating and building software technology companies.

Before founding Cofounders Capital, a $12 million early-stage seed fund, he was the Triangle’s most active and involved angel investor with over $7 million personally deployed in early stage ventures. As an adviser,Gardner spends his time working as an unpaid coach and mentor to startup companies and managing his free startup accelerator in Cary, NC.

As an entrepreneur, Gardmer has been the founder or co-founder of multiple successful companies in the Triangle including PeopleClick – which was purchased for $100 million – and Report2Web, which sold for $12M in less than eleven months from inception. He has demonstrated a record for consistency across multiple industries and markets with six successful exits in a row.

As a writer and thought leader, Gardner is author of a popular book on entrepreneurship called The StartUp Hats. He has published many articles and forward-thinking white papers on technical, marketing, and managerial topics. Gardner founded and launched the first hosted software-as-a- service enterprise application. For more see: https://www.startupgrind.com/raleigh/

NC CEO Forum features Arianna Huffington

The North Carolina CEO forum set for Nov. 11 at Prestonwood Country Club in Cary features the founder of the Huffington Post, Arianna Huffington and Gen. Keith Bl Alexander, retired, CEO and president of IronNet Cybersecurity.

The event is hosted by Rick Deckelbaum and Brian Kinahan, co-founders of the NC CEO Forum, along with Billie Redmond and Diane Adams.

For registration information see: http://www.ncceoforum.com/

Sprint layoffs likely

Kansa-based Sprint plans to slash between $2 billion and $2.5 billion in costs during the next six months – a move likely to cost some jobs.

A Sprint spokesman told c/net We have begun an effort to significantly take costs out of the business so the transformation of the company will be sustainable for the long term,” said a Sprint spokesman. “It is likely that some jobs will be impacted but it’s premature to discuss the details as we are in the early stages of the process.”

The Wall Street Journal reported the cuts last week. They are aimed at allowing the company to invest more money into its network, improving coverage and service and afford industry-low rates.

Spint saw rival T-Mobile surpass it as the nation’s third largest carrier this year.