Barings Real Estate, one of the world’s largest diversified real estate investment managers, has leased the 5th floor of its Landmark office development in Manchester to leading digital bank, Starling Bank.
Following a year of strong growth, Starling Bank has signed a 10 year lease for the 14,061 sq ft, 5th floor at Landmark which will be the digital bank’s fourth UK office and first Manchester base.
Starling is set to create 1,000 new jobs in Manchester to support the company’s next phase as it continues to build industry-disrupting banking technology for its personal and business account customers. The strategic move comes as the digital bank has opened more than 3.5 million accounts and launched its software-as-a-service offering, Engine by Starling. The bank has selected Manchester for its next base due to its strong tech talent pool and rich cultural and creative heritage.
Starling joins an impressive tenant roster at Landmark and is the fourth new occupier to sign up in recent weeks with over 41,000 sq ft of lettings secured in Q4 2022 alone to Santander UK, global business platform Xero UK and global audit, tax and consulting firm RSM UK. Additional occupiers in Landmark include; HSBC UK, Allianz Insurance, Grant Thornton, JLL and social enterprise Change Please.
The 180,000 sq ft award-winning Landmark development offers 14 floors of BREEAM Excellent and Wired Score Platinum certified office space in Manchester City Centre.
Barings’ focus on well-being, customer experience, sustainability and technological infrastructure at Landmark provides all-important facilities including contactless technologies enabling touch-free movement within the building, a dedicated cycle storage and maintenance hub, high-quality showers and changing facilities, electric car charging spaces and Amazon lockers for package delivery and returns.
Ian Mayhew, Managing Director, UK Asset management at Barings, said: “To have been selected by Starling Bank for its fourth UK office is fantastic news and we are delighted to welcome their team to Landmark. It’s great to see the leasing momentum continue into 2023 and we are pleased to be able to deliver a high class working environment for a range of innovative and market-leading businesses.”
Susanna Yallop, Chief People Officer at Starling Bank, said: “We’ve had some outstanding applications for our roles in Manchester already, affirming the city’s place as the tech capital of the North. We want to offer our talent the best of the best; the facilities at Landmark made it the obvious choice for us.”
