Almost a year after abandoning plans to move to 2 World Trade Center, 21st Century Fox and News Corp. have officially decided to stay at Their Sixth Avenue headquarters.
The two Rupert Murdoch companies signed new and expansion leases for a total of 1.2 million square feet at 1211 Sixth Avenue, the New York Post reported. Fox extended its lease — which was set to expire in 2020 — by five years and will expand its space by more than 128,000 square feet across three floors, bringing its total space to 784,000. News Corp. also extended its lease to 2025 for its 440,000 square feet space.
CBRE’s Mary Ann Tighe, Tim Dempsey, Ariel Ball, Ken Rapp and Christopher Mansfield represented Fox and News Corp. Cushman & Wakefield’s Josh Kuriloff, Mitch Arkin and Ethan Silverstein represented the owners. Ivanhoe Cambridge and its investment partner, Callahan Capital, bought the remaining 49 percent stake in the office tower in June for $913 million.
In January 2016, Murdoch announced that the companies would not move their headquarters to Silverstein Properties’ planned 2 World Trade Center. In June 2015, the companies had signed a non-binding letter of intent to take 1.3 million square feet in the planned 2.8 million-square-foot building.
Silverstein had changed the building’s architect from Norman Foster to Bjarke Ingels for the would-be tenants. Silverstein has not yet announced a replacement anchor tenant for the building. Fox and News Corp. indicated last year that they would likely stay at the Sixth Avenue location, but nothing was finalized. [NYP] — Kathryn Brenzel
Clarification: Since Fox and News Corp. signed new leases at the office building, they didn’t technically renew their original lease at 1211 Sixth Avenue, as reported earlier.