Microsoft Signs 50K SF Lease at Miami’s 830 Brickell
By Julia Echikson September 8, 2021 3:17 pm
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Microsoft has finally landed in Miami, marking the Magic City’s ascension as a tech hub.
The tech giant signed a long-term lease at 830 Brickell for approximately 50,000 square feet, Microsoft (MSFT) announced. The deal closed Wednesday morning.
“The new location will also serve as a bridge to deepen relationships with our customers while navigating the ever-changing hybrid work environment,” Mariana Castro, Microsoft’s Latin American vice president of marketing and operations, said in a statement.
The office will house Microsoft’s Latin American operations. With a lease that’s longer than 10 years, the new office is set to occupy the 45th, 46th and 47th floors, Cushman & Wakefield’s Ryan Holtzman and Brian Gale told Commercial Observer. They represented the developers, OKO Group and Cain International.
Located in Miami’s financial district, the 55-story 830 Brickell has become one of the city’s most high-profile office developments, boasting some of its highest asking rents and most notable leases. Earlier this year, private equity firm Thoma Bravo took 36,500 square feet at the property.
The 640,000-square-foot tower is currently under construction, and the developers will turn over the space to Microsoft by the third quarter of 2022, the C&W brokers added. The office is slated to open “mid-2023,” according to Microsoft’s Castro.
It’s unclear whether Microsoft will keep its current office at Cypress Park West in Fort Lauderdale. Colliers’ Alexander Brown, who represented the company, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Microsoft’s Miami office “is rocket fuel for our city’s growth as a technology hub,” said Manolo Reyes, chairman of the Miami Downtown Development Authority.
After a January 2020 article in Business Insider about a pending deal, Microsoft’s negotiations at the trophy tower quickly became lore around town, a sign of Miami’s appeal to the tech sector. (CO later verified BI’s report.)
Other companies soon followed. Heavyweight venture capital firms Founders Fund and Atomic inked leases at the Wynwood Annex in March 2020. A few months later, Wynwood hosted Bitcoin 2021, a massive cryptocurrency conference that drew 50,000 attendees, which spawned a slew of office relocations by crypto companies.
During the last quarter, the number of listings for tech jobs in Miami grew faster than in any other major U.S. city, according to a CompTIA analysis of Burning Glass Technologies Labor Insights data cited in the SFBJ as reported by The Next Miami.
Julia Echikson can be reached at jechikson@commercialobserver.com.
