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Andreessen Horowitz signs lease in Santa Monica
VC firm takes 26K sf building formerly pre-leased to WeWork
Andreessen Horowitz, one of Silicon Valley’s most prominent venture capital firms, is opening a new office in Santa Monica.
The firm signed a lease earlier this month at 1305 2nd Street in Downtown Santa Monica, a roughly 26,000-square-foot building that was put up for lease in 2020, according to public property records filed with L.A. County. Financial terms of the lease were not disclosed.
Built in 1915, the building, owned by an entity linked to Alan and Rafael Nissel, was formerly a hotel turned apartment complex, but was recently redeveloped by Beverly Hills-based King’s Arch into an office building. King’s Arch did not respond to a request for comment.
Sources familiar with the property said the building was previously pre-leased to WeWork, which exited the deal when the pandemic hit in 2020.
Andreessen Horowitz announced on Thursday that it would be opening three new offices across the country — in Miami Beach, New York and Santa Monica — to support remote workers.
“The firm is now virtual, but can materialize physically on command,” founder Ben Horowitz said in a release. “We have configured the firm to be able to physically assemble anywhere in the world and will continue to create physical offices globally where needed.”
Prior to these three new additions, the firm only had space in the Bay Area —at 2865 Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park and 180 Townsend Street in San Francisco. Andreessen Horowitz opened its San Francisco office in 2019, when tech companies were gradually shifting to have more of a presence in the city to attract young workers.
The firm’s Santa Monica office suggests an increased interest from VC firms in establishing a presence in the city, given the rise of tech firms opening offices along what’s dubbed Silicon Beach — the Westside stretch from Santa Monica down to Marina del Rey.
Snapchat, GoodRX, Headspace, Postmates and Flexport, among other smaller tech companies, all have office space across the area.
Marc Andreessen, who co-founded the firm, also seems to like L.A. The venture capitalist paid a record $177 million for a surfside home on Escondido Beach in Malibu and has since purchased two more beachfront homes for a combined $78.5 million.