Vodafone is setting up a new 6,373 sq m (68,600 sq ft) call centre operation in No 1 Brindleyplace, premises formerly occupied by troubled telecoms giant Ionica.
The mobile phone operator is thought to have beaten off other potential occupiers – including Railtrack and First Direct – to secure the only major chunk of available good-quality office space in central Birmingham, following the letting of Richardsons’ Imperial House to solicitor Irwin Mitchell.
Although Ionica was offering an assignment of its lease, Vodafone is understood to have agreed a new lease with the building’s freeholder British Airways Pension Fund. However, John Griffiths, director at Richard Ellis, which is advising BA, would only say there was “significant” interest in the building but not comment on Vodafone’s requirement.
Ionica’s administrators, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young, were looking for a premium in order to assign its lease on No 1 and Vodafone is believed to have agreed a rent well above the £199 per sq m (£18.50 per sq ft) Ionica was paying.
EGi News 04/02/99
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