The ten-storey building in the 4th Kilometer area of Sofia's Tsarigradsko Shose Blvd, which was constructed to house Alpha Bank's Bulgarian headquarters, has stood ghostly for years - shiny and well-kept, but uninhabited. It was only used for four years and has been empty since 2016 when the Greek lender withdrew from Bulgaria.
Now it has a new owner who may soon turn it into a space tech hub. At the end of August the building was bought by Raycho Raychev, founder, CEO and major owner (50%) of Bulgarian aerospace manufacturer EnduroSat in partnership with Petar Mitev, co-founder of 3D visualization company Chaos.
So far, official information has been scarce, but according to market data, the price stands around 20-21 million euro. The purpose of the purchase is apparently for the building to be used by the rising star in the space tech business in Bulgaria. "Tick tock, tick tock, gently and imperceptibly Bulgaria is becoming a key player in the space race! EnduroSat's new "space" base will be among the largest in Europe, and in terms of production capacity - the largest!", the chairman of the Bulgarian Employers Association of Innovative Technologies (BRAIT), Dobroslav Dimitrov, commented on Facebook.
"Where there is R&D technology and high-tech equipment, companies often prefer to have their own building, to be independent of landlords and contract terms, because these can create risks for their business processes. For these types of companies, the cost of moving an office into a new building is often very high. They have to duplicate technology, do it smoothly, without stopping work processes, in order not to lose operational business," said Yavor Kostov, Managing Partner at Cushman & Wakefield Forton (C&W Forton), which advised the buyer on the deal.
EnduroSat's space-ial plans
"We have specific plans for the development of the space sector and this building will be strategically important for the implementation of our goals," said Raychev, as per the C&W Forton's press release. He has promised to release more details in the coming months.
Raychev did not respond to a request from Capital Weekly for more details, hampered by the fact that he was in Denver, Colorado where EnduroSat has opened a new office to be closer to its U.S. customers. The company, founded in 2015 to democratize access to space through shared-services nanosatellites, has offices in the USA, Italy, France, Luxembourg, Germany, serving over 250 corporate clients.
The purchase comes after the company reported a record 2023 - it almost doubled turnover to around BGN 27 million (approximately EUR 13.5 million) and grew staff to 160 employees, 55 of whom are new hires. EnduroSat now has a dust- and contaminant-free room that allows satellites to be assembled in-house, and has expanded its testing labs in Sofia
Following these changes, the company can produce eight satellites per month by the end of 2024, with a goal of reaching ten on a sustainable basis. Raychev has been quoted as saying that if it executes this plan, the company will pass to the level of SpaceX, Blue Origin, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Airbus. He also recently announced that EnduroSat has signed contracts with the European Commission and the European Space Agency to launch the first two satellites, which will be part of a new generation of European Earth observation system from space.
In addition, in 2023 EnduroSat patented a concept for a DeskSat, a clone of a desktop satellite in orbit. And this year it expects to take another big step by creating its first satellite with a weight of more than 100 kg, which means entering a new business segment.
In its development, the company is supported by external investments of EUR 28 million. Of this, EUR 10 million was allocated in 2021 in the form of risk debt financing from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and a further EUR 10 million is being injected by Luxembourg's CEECAT Capital.
In the context of the expansion, Raycho Raichev announced six months ago that the company was looking for a second site - twice the size of the current ones - in which to set up its new technical laboratories. According to information from the sector, he has been in the process of selecting a new office for about a year and a half, checking everything available, building by building and street by street.
The bank HQ that was and was not on the market at the same time
Within the real estate sector, the former headquarters building of Alpha Bank in Sofia is known as simultaneously being on the market and not quite. The reason for it staying vacant is that in 2015 the business of the Bulgarian branch of Alpha Bank was acquired by Bulgaria's Postbank, a division of Athens-headquartered Eurobank. Back then, some of the assets were left out of the deal and a number of properties were spun off into separate legal entities, which Alpha Bank has been gradually selling off.
The HQ building on Tsarigradsko Shose Blvd. in particular has been "locked in" by a nine-year litigation with the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (BAS) over the ownership of the 2.8-acre plot on which the building is standing. The dispute between the two parties was settled at the end of 2021. BAS was recognized as the owner of the land, then Alpha Bank bought the plot from the bank, thus becoming owner of both the building and the land.
The ten-storey building in the 4th Kilometer area of Sofia's Tsarigradsko Shose Blvd, which was constructed to house Alpha Bank's Bulgarian headquarters, has stood ghostly for years - shiny and well-kept, but uninhabited. It was only used for four years and has been empty since 2016 when the Greek lender withdrew from Bulgaria.
Now it has a new owner who may soon turn it into a space tech hub. At the end of August the building was bought by Raycho Raychev, founder, CEO and major owner (50%) of Bulgarian aerospace manufacturer EnduroSat in partnership with Petar Mitev, co-founder of 3D visualization company Chaos.
