HOUSTON – (Realty News Report) – Exxon Mobil announced Monday that it will relocate its corporate headquarters from Irving in the Dallas suburbs to its 385-acre City Place campus in the Houston area, located in northern Harris County.
Exxon Mobil already occupies a large complex at City Place: roughly 3 million square feet across 20 buildings. The campus sits near Interstate 45, just north of the Grand Parkway.
The headquarters move, part of a broader reorganization of Exxon Mobil’s management structure, will bring about 400 jobs to Houston from North Texas.
“Houston is the ENERGY CAPITAL OF THE WORLD, for Pete’s Sake!” – Randall Onstead
Beyond job growth, the decision bolsters Houston’s prestige by adding one of the world’s largest corporations to City Place’s roster of headquarters.
Exxon’s return to the Houston area recalls its earlier relocation from New York in 1989 to Irving’s Las Colinas business park, a move that drew criticism from some Houstonians at the time. Many viewed Houston as the natural home for a major oil and gas company. “Houston is the ENERGY CAPITAL OF THE WORLD, for Pete’s sake,” Greater Houston Partnership president Randall Onstead told former Houston Chronicle reporter Ralph Bivins the day Irving was selected in 1989.
City Place, a 2,000-acre development that also houses the headquarters of Hewlett Packard Enterprise, was developed by CDC Houston, a subsidiary of Coventry Development of New York.
“We are delighted, of course,” said Warren Wilson, CDC’s executive at City Place. “It’s great for Houston and City Place.” (City Place previously was known as Springwoods Village.)
The relocation is expected to be completed by mid-2023. Exxon Mobil says the move will enable closer collaboration across teams and support a streamlined business model intended to accelerate value delivery across the company.
CEO Woods: Positioning Exxon Mobil for the Energy Transition
“We greatly value our long history in Irving and appreciate the strong ties we have developed in the North Texas community,” said Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods. “Closer collaboration and the new streamlined business model will enable the company to grow shareholder value and position Exxon Mobil for success through the energy transition.”
In recent years Exxon Mobil has been trimming its real estate holdings, selling excess land near its Irving headquarters and consolidating office space. The company reported steep losses in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic — about $22 billion, its first annual loss in four decades — and reduced its workforce by thousands.
As part of its consolidation, Exxon Mobil is vacating roughly 500,000 square feet of space at Hughes Landing in The Woodlands and will fold those operations into the main City Place campus.
The move to City Place follows another major corporate commitment to the development: Hewlett Packard Enterprise moved its headquarters there recently, marking two significant corporate HQs for City Place in just over a year.
Jan. 31, 2022 Realty News Report Copyright 2022.
Image: City Place and Exxon Mobil’s 3 million SF campus in Spring, Texas, north of Houston. Courtesy: CDC Houston and Coventry Development
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