Rippling is about to take up nearly 30,000 square feet of offices in a skyscraper in downtown Chicago.
The San Francisco-based human resources software company is “nearing a lease” for the offices at 111 South Wacker Drive, Crain’s Chicago Business reported, citing an anonymous source. Terms of the pending deal with landlord Union Investments were not disclosed.
If a deal goes through, it would be the first flag by the tech firm in the Windy City. It would also demonstrate the resilience of modern, high-rise workplaces in a city with plenty of downtown office options.
Rippling has a platform used by businesses to help automate payroll, benefits, hiring and other workforce management tasks.
A new office in Chicago, if established by the West Coast firm, would join a new wave of tech companies with new or expanded offices in the city.
Online payments provider Stripe, blockchain technology firm Ripple (not to be confused with Rippling) and artificial intelligence company Databricks are among those that have inked or are finalizing deals downtown, according to Crain’s.
A spokesperson for Rippling declined to comment. But there are 19 job openings for the company based in Chicago, including a manager role that “will eventually go into our future Chicago office” in the “West Loop/Fulton Market area” by early next year, according to its website.
The 51-story blue-glass tower at 111 South Wacker Drive, built in 2005 on a design by Lohan Caprile Goettsch Architects, is owned by Union Investment, based in Germany.
The 1.2 million-square-foot building had faced a leasing slump two years ago when law firms White & Case and Locke Lord pulled up stakes for other buildings.
But Union Investment managed to score a lease with law firm Venable, and will backfill more offices with a lease to Rippling, according to the business journal. The skyscraper is now 92 percent leased, compared to a 72 percent average in downtown, according to CoStar Group.
Since the building opened 21 years ago, accounting firm Deloitte has been its anchor tenant.
Rippling, founded in 2017, has $1.8 billion in venture capital, according to its website. This year, Rippling CEO Parker Conrad said the company has 5,000 employees globally and is generating more than $1 billion in annualized revenue.
— Dana Bartholomew
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