20 Marlborough companies moved or expanded in 2018

Photo | Grant Welker Allegro MicroSystems, a maker of computer circuits, left its longtime Worcester home last year for 100 Crowley Drive in Marlborough.

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Marlborough saw 20 companies either move into the city or expand last year, adding upwards of 350 jobs, according to the Marlborough Economic Development Corp.'s annual report released Wednesday.

That list includes Allegro MicroSystems, a maker of computer circuits, which left its longtime Worcester home for an office building at 100 Crowley Drive, and ExaGrid, a data storage company that moved from Westborough to 350 Campus Drive. Repligen, a Waltham biological drugmaker, added a facility at 111 Locke Drive.

Those companies drove the bulk of what the MEDC says was 250,000 square feet of additional occupied commercial space in the city last year.

“Commercial space is running out in Marlborough, and that’s a good thing,” MEDC Executive Director Meredith Harris said in the report. “We’ve been sowing the seeds of economic development and are now reaping the benefits of a strong commercial base, increasing demand from developers, enhanced amenities and the area’s lowest residential tax rate.”

Marlborough's commercial vacancy rate fell to 9 percent last year, the MEDC said, citing Regional Resource Group data. That's a sharp fall from a rate of 35 percent in 2009.

Other economic signs show Marlborough is improving in other areas, too.

Revenue from hotel rooms rose by 8 percent to more than $2.7 million and a local tax surcharge on restaurant meals brought in an additional 14 percent last year, topping $1 million.