LinkedIn, the jobs and professional networking social media platform, is to significantly scale back plans to expand its office space at a new campus in Dublin, RTÉ News has learned.
The company said the decision is a consequence of more of its Irish based staff working from home more often, which means it does not need as big an office footprint.
The Microsoft owned business continues to recruit new employees in Ireland and sources indicated the decision would not impact its hiring plans here.
LinkedIn currently occupies a large building at Wilton Place, not far from Dublin city centre.
Commercial real estate developer IPUT is currently developing 600,000 sq ft of new office space beside this in a development called Wilton Park, along with a new public square, retail facilities, café and a restaurant at a cost of €350m.
LinkedIn agreed to pre-let block one of the new complex in 2018 and then blocks two, three and four in 2020, in order to create a new Dublin campus for its employees.
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But this morning it is understood that staff were told that the company has now decided not to occupy Two and Three Wilton and will only use One Wilton, as well as Four Wilton when the project is completed around 2025.
"With our shift to hybrid, more of our team in Ireland are working from home on some days and from the office on others, so we've also made the decision to not occupy Two and Three Wilton when construction finishes," LinkedIn said in a statement in response to questions from RTÉ News.
"We're excited to open the doors of our new One Wilton building. In this new space we’ll continue to create amazing office experiences that welcome in employees, create new connections and build a sense of community," the company said.
"The first group of our Dublin employees will move in the week of November 7," it added.
It is understood that through its parent Microsoft, LinkedIn has a 12 year lease agreement with IPUT on Two and Three Wilton Park, and it will therefore have to sublet the properties if it is not going to occupy them.
According to industry sources, combined with LinkedIn's existing 130,000 sq ft of office space at Wilton Place, the addition of the One Wilton building will give it a total of 283,000 sq ft.
If it had occupied Wilton Two and Three, it would have added a further 265,000 sq ft of space, when construction is completed at the end of 2024.
LinkedIn currently employs over 2,000 staff in Ireland.
The development is the latest sign of shifting needs for office space among companies, as the approach to work changes in the wake of the pandemic.
In August the Irish Times reported that TikTok had pulled out of talks to rent over 16,000 square metres of office space at the Shipping Office development in the Docklands, though it later agreed to lease the nearby Tropical Fruit Warehouse from IPUT.
In July, the Sunday Times reported that Facebook parent Meta had paused the fit-out of its new Fibonacci Square European headquarters complex at the old AIB Bankcentre complex in Ballsbridge as it re-evaluated its real estate requirements globally.
Twitter was also reported to be seeking to let out one of the floors in its Cumberland Street premises in Dublin in a bid to cut costs.
Earlier this month, real estate agents Savills said Dublin office market take-up reached 815,000 sq ft in the third quarter of the year, more than double that achieved in the same period last year and 78% higher than the ten-year third quarter average.
But commercial real estate company Cushman and Wakefield also said the amount of office space under construction in Dublin had dropped in the third quarter of this year despite a firm level of demand for new buildings.
In July, an analysis by commercial property agents CBRE claimed activity in the Dublin office market continued to gather pace in the second quarter, making it the strongest April to June period since 2018.
BNP Paribas Real Estate in May said that while rents for the very best modern offices in Dublin were rising, the mainstream market for business space was moving in favour of tenants due to rising vacancy.
