OpenAI is looking for more office space in San Francisco as other AI firms like startup Glean move into town.
The Sam Altman-led firm is on the hunt for more offices to lease in the city after a rapid expansion of more than 800,000 square feet over nearly two years, the San Francisco Business Times reported. The company is purportedly looking to add between 200,000 and 300,000 square feet to its portfolio.
Once based in the Mission District, OpenAI subleased nearly half a million square feet of offices at 1455 and 1515 3rd Street in Mission Bay from Uber in October 2023. The following September, OpenAI additionally grabbed all 315,000 square feet next door at 550 Terry A. Francois Boulevard.
At the grand opening of its Mission Bay headquarters in March, executives pledged to double its current San Francisco-based workforce of 2,000 people. It currently has “over 1 million square feet of office space” to spread out, the Business Times reported.
Meanwhile, AI-powered productivity startup Glean is spreading its wings with a new office in San Francisco. The Palo Alto-based company will simultaneously keep its headquarters in the Peninsula city and has already moved some operations into its new 45,000-square-foot space at 634 2nd Street in San Francisco’s South Beach neighborhood.
Glean is subleasing nearly the entirety of the 2nd Street building from Cloudflare, according to the Business Times. Cloudflare listed the building for sublease in 2021 and maintains its headquarters a block away at 101 Townsend Street.
The startup is opening the new San Francisco office to “support its growth,” saying in a June 10 statement that the move “reinforc[es] its “long-term commitment to innovation, talent and delivering value to customers at scale.”
CBRE estimates AI firms occupy approximately 5 million square feet of offices in San Francisco today and expects that number to quadruple to 21 million square feet over the next five years. That would effectively cut San Francisco’s office vacancy rate in half from approximately 35.8 percent in the first quarter to 18 percent by 2030. — Chris Malone Méndez
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