Being a sucker for stories of corporate ingenuity, strategy and deal making, I am looking forward to hearing how Intel assembled the requisite real estate in one of Central Ohio’s hottest markets without attracting outside attention. Pretty clearly, they had to enlist a number of movers and shakers early on to pull this off. The New Albany connection makes sense when considering that this is exactly how Wexner and his partners “captured” the formerly sleepy village originally to enrich themselves further. A proven formula.
To return to topic, there are some OU connections in Columbus’ hierarchy, chief among them, the Walters family. Start there.
Part of it had to do with the land being out here in sleepy little Licking County. NAlbany annexed a chunk of Jersey Township a few years ago. If it had been in Franklin or Delaware county I'm not sure they could've kept the lid on it. I imagine that they put together a small army of unconnected buyers for the land so it couldn't be easily traced to Intel.
As for getting Intel to do naming rights, I think Boals still lives in the NAlbany area, so there might be an in there.