Ballymore and M&G secure Birmingham’s biggest ever office letting

Telecoms giant BT signs 20-year lease on 283,000sq ft of space at Three Snowhill

An artist’s impression of the offices at Three Snowhill in Birmingham.
An artist’s impression of the offices at Three Snowhill in Birmingham.

Developer Sean Mulryan's Ballymore and its UK-headquartered partner, M&G Real Estate have secured Birmingham's largest ever single office letting with an agreement to let 26,291sq m (283,000sq ft) of space in the city to BT on a 20-year lease.

Located at Three Snowhill, the UK’s largest speculative office development outside London, the new office space is being set aside to accommodate up to 4,000 of the telecoms giant’s personnel by the end of 2020.

Welcoming BT's decision to locate at the £200 million (€236 million) scheme, Ballymore's chairman and group chief executive, Sean Mulryan, said: "Birmingham's Snowhill estate has been a 16-year project for Ballymore, creating one million sq ft of offices, award-winning public realm and a new business quarter for the city. We're very proud of this legacy and we're delighted that BT has chosen Three Snowhill ahead of its completion."

Martin Towns, head of UK commercial and global capital partnerships at M&G Real Estate added: "Our agreement today with BT further reinforces the success of our UK office development strategy, helping to provide the quality of accommodation modern business requires, whilst also providing attractive investment returns for our clients. We have now delivered over 1 million sq ft of new, Grade A office space across the UK, from Reading in the south to Edinburgh in the north."

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Other developments

Beyond its involvement in the Three Snowhill and the wider Snowhill estate, Ballymore is engaged in the delivery of numerous commercial and residential developments both in the UK and Ireland.

According to the directors’ report accompanying the latest accounts for Ballymore Ltd, the wider Ballymore Group of companies has “active developments” with a projected gross development value of £4.7 billion (€5.5 billion).

Along with the “active developments” under management via the Mulryan family and joint ventures, the group has residential developments with a gross development value of £1.9 billion (€2.2 billion) that have been granted planning permission but have not yet been activated. Ballymore has a forward pipeline of more than 7,500 homes and 1.5 million sq ft of commercial space.

Ronald Quinlan

Ronald Quinlan

Ronald Quinlan is Property Editor of The Irish Times