Rejuvenated business ‘will need London office space’

[Published April 2011 and updated June 2023] As the UK economy’s recovery slowly gains pace, businesses will be in need of more office space in London, recent research has discovered.

Over the next three years London’s financial services sector will add up to 11,000 more employees and will need space to house them, research from BNP Paribas’ commercial real estate unit has discovered.

To put this in perspective, the space needed is the equivalent of four of The Shard skyscrapers.

Banks are to require at least 1.6 million square feet of office space for their new employees, the research found, mostly in the City and Mayfair areas.

Read our guide to Renting an Office in Mayfair

Of the companies surveyed in the research, a full 75 per cent said that they were planning on expansion in the next three years, and 55 per cent said that they would be adding a significant number of new employees.

Fred Hargreaves, head of BNP Paribas Real Estate’s City agency was quoted in the FT as saying: “There will be a lot of smaller firms taking larger offices, a lot like how the recovery started after the dotcom bust in 2003 and 2004.

“Taxation is a big concern, however.”

The years 2012 and 2013 would see some major moves Hargreaves added, as leases signed in the 1980s and 90s ran out.

However, over three-quarters of those surveyed had fears about government regulation of the financial sector. “Poorly thought out regulation of banks” was a major concern as was “increasing taxes on banks and bankers”.

Due to be completed in 2012, The Shard will be the tallest building in the EU and the 45^th tallest building in the world. It will have 586,509 square feet of office space and 62,129 square feet of residential apartments.

It will replace Southwark Towers, designed in 1976.

Editor’s notes: As of June 2023, following the pandemic, the way offices were used had changed for many occupiers. Whilst there were still large leasing deals completed across Central London in 2022 – particularly by big players in the Banking & Financial Services, Professional Services, and the Technology, media and telecoms (TMT) sectors, many companies of varying sizes and in a large cross-section of sectors, hybrid working models were being experimented with.

Those that were experimenting were increasingly utilising products from the flexible workspace industry such as fully-fitted serviced private offices with all-inclusive rents, and coworking desk space membership packages.

As of June 2023, there were over 200 serviced office providers in London and their profiles can be seen on the link.