Dubbed 30 Churchill Place, the new tower will boast 20 stories and 500,000 square feet of office space and is set to be completed in 2014. Construction will begin in the last quarter of 2011.
Already half the office space has been pre-let to the European Medicines Agency, and developer the Canary Wharf Group (CWG) says it is confident that the rest of the building will be leased by the time it is completed.
Chairman and chief executive George Iacobescu said: “We are very pleased to provide the European Medicines Agency with a building that responds to its new requirements, offering new technology and significant organisational and environmental efficiencies. It demonstrates our continued ability to deliver superior office space and infrastructure for a broad range of world-class organisations.”
According to CWG, approximately 97 per cent of office space in the Docklands is rented, despite the financial crisis and the recession that followed.
“Going ahead with Churchill Place is a vote of confidence in Canary Wharf,” a spokesman for CWG said.
“There’s always boom and bust in the London property market, and we’re expecting a shortage in 2013-14.”
Iacobescu told the Financial Times that the new office development was “the end of the beginning” for Canary Wharf.
Overall, Canary Wharf contains approximately 14 million square feet of office and retail space, of which CWG owns 7,900,000 square feet.
Numerous banks and financial service companies have their European headquarters in Canary Wharf, including Barclays, Citigroup, Clifford Chance, HSBC, KPMG, MetLife and Thompson Reuters.
Approximately 90,000 people currently work in Canary Wharf, built on the site of the West India Docks, which closed in 1980.
Editor’s notes: 30 Churchill Place was completed in 2014, and, in addition to the EMA renting Levels 1 to 10, Ernst and Young (EY) agreed to lease Levels 11 to 21 in 2015.
Due to BREXIT, the EMA relocated to Amsterdam and then sublet its space to flexible workspace provider WeWork.
See the type of space WeWork provides in Canary Wharf here
See space from all flexible office space providers in Canary Wharf here
As of July 2023, 30 Churchill Place had 56,692 square feet of office space available to rent on Levels 11 and 13.
In June 2023, HSBC announced that it would be vacating 8 Canada Square in Canary Wharf and relocating to the City.
The 45-storey property had been its home for two decades. The bank intended to leave in 2026.
In August 2025, HSBC announced that it had signed a 15-year lease for 210,000 square feet at 40 Bank Street in Canary Wharf in order to maintain a presence in the district.
In August 2026, CWG and Qatar Investment Authority submitted plans to overhaul 8 Canada Square when HSBC move out in 2027. The plans included refurbishment of the offices and transforming the top third of the tower into a visitor attraction and hotel.
The plans also outlined the intention to remove large sections of the 45-storey building’s facade to create a series of overlapping terraces and balconies.
Also in August 2026, it was revealed that CWG co-owners Brookfield and Qatar Investment Authority had bought the HQ tower of Société Générale (SocGen) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1-5 Bank Street, from CWG.
CWG sold the asset to its own investors, Brookfield and the Qatar Investment Authority, for £625 million.