Nashville medical mart to add New York consulting firm as tenant

The property development company behind Nashville’s medical mart has reached an agreement with its third tenant, New York-based mdi Consultants Inc.

The consulting firm will be the “anchor tenant” of the 1 million-square-foot Nashville Medical Trade Center‘s just-announced Global Business Development Center, according to a statement from Market Center Management Co., the Dallas-based property developer that would operate the medical mart.

Essentially, the Global Business Development Center is designed to be a one-stop shop for foreign healthcare companies looking for help in getting products on the U.S. market. Not so coincidentally, that’s also mdi’s specialty. The center’s offerings will include regulatory and compliance assistance, product lab testing, quality system compliance, reimbursement assistance and business development aid.

Although Great Neck, New York-based mdi has reached an agreement to take space in the medical mart, the company has not yet signed a lease. “We anticipate they will be a long-term partner, but specific lease terms have yet to be worked out,” said Cole Daugherty, a spokesman for the Nashville Medical Trade Center.

As far as Cleveland is concerned, it’s unclear whether mdi ever considered taking space in its medical mart, or whether mdi even engaged in discussions with MMPI, the Chicago-based property developer that would operate Cleveland’s $465 million, 100,000-square-foot medical mart.

A representatives from mdi didn’t immediately return a call. An MMPI spokesman declined comment.

MMPI has yet to sign any tenants to leases, or at least publicly announce that it’s done so. The property developer has, however, signed letters of intent with 46 companies, though those letters of intent aren’t binding.

Nashville’s other publicly announced tenants are Lipscomb University and the Healthcare Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS). However, it’s been slow going for Nashville in reaching deals with tenants, which has to be encouraging for backers of Cleveland’s competing medical mart.

At this point, reaching deals for showroom space is far more important to Nashville than Cleveland. That’s because Nashville’s medical mart will be privately financed, and Market Center must lease 60 to 70 percent of its 1 million square feet of showroom space to secure its financing, Daugherty said.

Thanks to public funding via a quarter-cent county-wide sales tax hike, Cleveland isn’t under that obligation.

Both medical marts are scheduled to open in 2013, though Cleveland will almost certainly open first thanks to its advantage in funding.

MMPI announced last week that it’s scheduled a ceremonial groundbreaking for the Cleveland Medical Mart & Convention Center on Jan. 14.