Nashville medical mart adds fourth tenant: Chinese medical technology showroom

Nashville’s medical mart project has announced its fourth tenant, which it’s calling the “China Pavilion” — a showroom that will feature products and services from yet-to-be-determined Chinese medical technology companies.

Beijing-based Huida Investment Management Company will be responsible for developing the pavilion and initially plans on leasing 10,000 square feet in Nashville’s planned 1 million-square-foot medical mart, according to a statement from property developer Market Center Management Co.

Huida is working with two of the largest medical associations in China to recruit companies for the space.

Market Center said the China space would be “the first in a series” of international showrooms designed to showcase products from individual countries.

The China Pavilion is just the fourth announcement in what’s been a slow trickle of tenant deals for Nashville’s medical mart, which appears to be struggling mightily to close deals. In September, developers said they were in the final stages of negotiations with 15 tenants, but with today’s announcement, the number since that proclamation has reached just two.

(In December, Nashville identified New York-based regulatory consulting firm mdi Consultants as tenant No. 3. The other two announced tentants are Lipscomb University and trade group the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society.)

That slow progress has prompted some business and community leaders in Nashville to wonder whether they should begin exploring other options for the city’s convention center, which is slated be part of the medical mart complex.

In contrast, Cleveland, Nashville’s counterpart in the medical mart competition, last month publicly identified 58 tenants for its 100,000-square-foot mart. That development gives Cleveland a significant leg up on Nashville, which must prelease about 60 percent of its space to secure the private financing necessary to begin construction. Cleveland, on the other hand, is publicly financing its $465 million medical mart and broke ground on its construction site earlier this year.

Both Cleveland and Nashville say they plan to open their medical marts in 2013, but at this point, Cleveland appears to be the only one with a realistic shot at hitting that target.