High: What's interesting about Amazon is that they have been in the San Diego market for a while. Its location in Solana Beach has been growing consistently, and it has distribution centers in South County and along the 15. This project will be a consolidation—it will be a mixed-use facility for office and technology, as well as overseeing San Diego growth. It will be a mixed bag for Amazon and demonstrates significant growth for them in this market. At one point, they were in 80,000 square feet, and then they took over 100,000 square feet in one of higher-priced office options for a user in San Diego. The company basically made that move off of the corporate culture from up north; they are trying to implement that move in San Diego. Campus Pointe offers workout facilities, an eatery, outdoor space with soccer fields and a potential brewery. This is the corporate culture that San Diego is really beginning to offer across the county in a lot of the newer developments.

Bruce: Some of the other drivers for this move are the intellectual capital San Diego offers through its universities—UC San Diego, the University of San Diego and San Diego State University—along with our tech base in San Diego. UC is investing a little under $1 billion into the market; it's adding commuter/specialty-type schools on campus, along with housing and other amenities. It's a massive move for all the intellectual capital here and all the young talent coming to town. The tech base is here and growing, and San Diego's workforce is also more affordable than San Francisco and Seattle, markets that are tapped out.

GlobeSt.com: How will this tenant affect the rest of the region as an office attractor for other major tenants?

High: San Diego has always had a tech hub—it's not surprising with Qualcomm here and the synergy of tech innovative companies in the Central San Diego market—but the new tech companies like Amazon, Google and other big tech groups coming to San Diego are affecting the San Diego market significantly in a positive way. The last four months have been strong: Intel came back into town and took a large space, Google took a large footprint here last year, and Qualcomm is not a new player to the team. We pride ourselves on tech talent and intellectual capital. What provides credibility is big moves like Amazon coming to town, which is proving that San Diego is a continuing and upcoming market for tech talent. Getting companies like Amazon that are more software companies than hardware companies like Qualcomm will bring a new Millennial base to San Diego, and that's really what is needed for it to grow and flourish.

Bruce: Also, all the ancillary businesses that support Amazon will flourish. I use Amazon Fresh, and those orders are delivered by drivers in Hertz rental cars or by the post office. It's an all-around supporter of tech-based services and all the hard goods that are coming in.

GlobeSt.com: What will Amazon moving in do to office rental rates in this market in 2018?

Bruce: It's a little over a 100,000-square-foot space in a $500-million-square-foot market, so it's not goig to impact rental rates, but it's a feel-good thing that Amazon is putting its flag in the ground for San Diego.

High: Obviously, this is a drop in the bucket for total office space in San Diego; it's difficult for one deal to move rental rates in an entire market. But it encourages talent to move up to a more amenitized space. It justifies owners putting in the amenities tenants are looking for, and they can charge higher rates to justify the investment.

GlobeSt.com: How will Amazon's entrance into the office market affect the industrial/e-commerce channels in San Diego?

Bruce: As it expands its Amazon Prime and Fresh businesses, especially same-day deliveries, our industrial market will benefit. Amazon will pick up more locations for industrial distribution.

High: I think we've already seen that. Amazon, prior to this transaction, has already affected those sectors. It has taken space all over San Diego for continued growth here.

SAN DIEGO—The mixed-use space at Alexandria Real Estate Equities' Campus Pointe Office Park that Amazon will occupy strengthens San Diego's reputation as a viable tech market and one whose ancillary businesses will benefit from the retailer's growth here, NKF senior managing directors Steve Bruce and Chris High tell GlobeSt.com. Amazon recently signed a lease for 107,000 square feet of space at 10300 Campus Pointe Dr., a space that will accommodate 500 employees and that represents the giant's first major office in the region.

While Amazon has a small office presence in Solana Beach and several last-mile distribution centers throughout the area, its latest move here points to San Diego as a growing technology center, and technology companies remain attracted to the region's talent. According to NKF's Q3 office report, the University of San Diego graduates an average of 10,000 students each year whose ratio of technology, engineering and science-related degrees is substantially higher than the national average.

We spoke with Bruce and High about the market's attractiveness for companies like Amazon and how this move might affect the region.