Yahoo moving HQ to ex-NYT office
Talking to city officials about erecting a large illuminated sign at the top of the building
New York: New media is replacing old in Times Square.
Yahoo, the giant web company that agreed on Sunday to buy Tumblr for $1.1 billion (Dh4 billion), is moving its New York headquarters to the former home of The New York Times, on 43rd Street, east of Eighth Avenue, where it plans to expand.
Yahoo is talking to city officials about erecting a large illuminated sign with its name on the cupola at the top of the building, where The Times once had its own sign.
The move, announced on Monday, illustrates the rapid growth and importance of the technology industry in the city’s economy.
Yahoo, which has signed a long-term lease for the nineth through 12th floors in the 15-story building, is joining two other tech tenants there: 10gen, which makes database software, and Citysearch, a local search engine.
Yahoo is based in Silicon Valley. The company, which has about 500 employees in three buildings in New York City, said it expected to expand its workforce in the city to 700 within the next couple of years, particularly in the engineering area. Microsoft is moving to 11 Times Square, and Facebook is nearby.
“For a while now,” Marissa Mayer, Yahoo’s chief executive, said, “Yahoo has been looking for a home here in New York. We have several hundred employees spread across several offices. And I’m proud to say that we’ve found it.”
The company’s New York employees work at 1065 Avenue of the Americas (at 40th Street), 1540 Broadway (at 45th Street) and 11 W. 19th St.
Lately, Mayer has focused on reinvigorating the company, armed with billions of dollars in cash from the sale of half its interest in Chinese Internet company Alibaba. On Sunday, Yahoo agreed to pay cash for Tumblr, a blogging service.
Tumblr’s 175 employees work from offices at 35 E. 21st St., and they will not move to Times Square. In order to attract employees, Yahoo plans to install the kind of amenities at the former Times building that are common at tech companies, including outdoor terraces and a cafeteria with an extensive menu of free food.
