Microsoft Announces New Headquarters in Canada

Microsoft Canada today announced it’s opening a new headquarters in downtown Toronto. The company’s new headquarters will be built at 81 Bay Street over the next 2 years.

The company plans to offer more than 60,000 new jobs by the time the new headquarters is opened. The new headquarters will compromises of 132,00 square foot, and over floors. “Our Government’s Innovation and Skills Plan is working. Leading tech companies are setting up offices across Canada, hiring Canadian talent, and investing in Canada’s enormous potential as an innovation and tech hub. Microsoft’s latest investment in Canada – totaling $570 million – will create hundreds of new jobs and benefit several cities, from Vancouver to Toronto to Montreal. I know our highly-skilled, diverse workforce will continue to attract tech investment in record numbers – growing our economy and creating new opportunities for Canadians across the country,” said Justin Trudeau, Prime Minster of Canada.

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Microsoft’s new Canadian HQ seems like a promising investment from the firm, and could lead to further investments in the Canadian economy going forward. The  firm already announced some of the future investments its going to make, including:

  • grow staff by more than 500 full-time employees, with an additional 500 co-ops/internships by 2022
  • invest $21 M in Azure credits to the Canada’s Supercluster initiative
  • invest $10M over 5 years into Cascadia innovation corridor which is formed between Washington and British Columbia to create new economic opportunities
  • invest more than $570M in next 3 years in fixed assets in the country, including relocation and expansion of its research and development lab in Montreal, relocation of its Vancouver sales office, renovation and redesign of its Ottawa, Calgary and Montreal sales offices, and the relocation of its Canadian Headquarters

The company’s new Canadian HQ joins its multibillion-dollar campus overhaul planned to be finished within the next 5-6 years.

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Conversation 17 comments

  • djncanada

    Premium Member
    11 September, 2018 - 2:31 pm

    <p>nice to see as a Canadian, Trudeau government attracting tech, wonder if there will be huge investment in AI as well, great news</p>

    • ommoran

      Premium Member
      11 September, 2018 - 3:27 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#320710">In reply to djncanada:</a></em></blockquote><p>Indeed, fellow Canadian waving the flag. Nice to see it isn't just data center workers for government and contractor data security.</p>

  • bluvg

    11 September, 2018 - 3:08 pm

    <p>60,000 jobs? Extra zeroes in there?</p>

  • CompUser

    11 September, 2018 - 3:23 pm

    <p>"The company plans to offer more than 60,000 new jobs by the time the new headquarters is opened." Seems to be pretty much contradicted by the rest of the story, "Grow staff by more than 500 full-time employees, with an additional 500 co-ops/internships by 2022" seems a bit more realistic for a 132,000 square-foot facility.</p>

  • jrjr

    11 September, 2018 - 3:25 pm

    <p>Even I might be able to get a job there if they create 60,000 of them! Not sure about working conditions though @ 0.22 sq ft per employee</p>

  • pecosbob04

    11 September, 2018 - 3:27 pm

    <p>OMFSM has 45 been informed of this atrocity? 60K (haha) good jobs not going to Muricans. Oh the tariffs this will spawn.</p><p><br></p>

  • Jim

    11 September, 2018 - 3:42 pm

    <p>Looks like the jobs are "ecosystem" jobs (from the source Canadian government announcement): </p><p><br></p><p>"Currently, Microsoft employs more than 2,300 employees across Canada, and supports an extended ecosystem of more than 14,000 trusted partners who sell, service or deploy Microsoft products. The company expects that given the pace of technology and the investments it is making that the Microsoft ecosystem could account for more than 60,000 new jobs by the time its new headquarters opens in two years."</p>

  • hrlngrv

    Premium Member
    11 September, 2018 - 3:56 pm

    <p><em style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">The new headquarters will compromises&nbsp;of 132,00 square foot, and over floors.</em></p><p><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Grammar checkers desperately needed.</span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Then there's the math. 60K jobs all in that location? Even with 4 shifts, that'd be 15K people at a time, and 132K / 15K gives less than 9 square </span><em style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">feet</em><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> per person, so less than 3' x 3'. Cozy.</span></p>

  • locust infested orchard inc

    11 September, 2018 - 4:53 pm

    <p>Having read the<a href="https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/microsoft-announces-new-canadian-headquarters-in-downtown-toronto-692971421.html&quot; target="_blank" style="color: rgb(0, 110, 206); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><strong> official Microsoft press release</strong></a>&nbsp;via <a href="https://news.microsoft.com/en-ca/&quot; target="_blank" style="color: rgb(0, 110, 206); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><strong>Microsoft Canada</strong></a> the <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">new Microsoft Canada HQ will comprise 132,000 square feet over four floors at the 81 Bay Street building in downtown Toronto, now under construction.</span></p><p><br></p><p>The figure of 60,000 new jobs is not related directly to the new employees jammed like sardines at the new HQ (as some commenters have rightly quizzed), but rather the figure is an estimate of the total number of new Microsoft-related jobs within Canada, possibly including new employees at the new HQ, once the HQ is constructed.</p><p><br></p><p>This announcement will for sure delight the occupant of The Oval Office. 😀 ;-)</p><p><br></p><p>It's as if Satya has given a one-finger salute to Trump and his rhetoric of 'bringing US jobs back'.</p>

  • soundersfan

    Premium Member
    11 September, 2018 - 4:58 pm

    <p>The last two MLS finals have been Seattle Sounders vs Toronto FC. Coincidence? I think not.</p>

  • waethorn

    11 September, 2018 - 7:56 pm

    <p>The ONLY reason they're doing this is to counter Google's lakeshore investments in the city.</p>

    • Stooks

      11 September, 2018 - 8:24 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#320980">In reply to Waethorn:</a></em></blockquote><p>Yeah they are investing over half a billion, just to counter Google's presence in town? Look we all know you are complete Gtard these days but back off the hysteria a bit.</p>

      • waethorn

        12 September, 2018 - 2:19 pm

        <blockquote><em><a href="#320992">In reply to Stooks:</a></em></blockquote><p>You're just wrong. I did the Google thing for a couple years but once they started their big censorship campaign just to pick sides in a useless US election, I dropped them like a wet rag. I haven't used a Chromebook since last year, and deleted my Google Account several months ago. I don't use a smartphone anymore.</p><p><br></p><p>And just to be clear, I got rid of Microsoft stuff for the same reason – their privacy policy was getting worse while Google's was getting better. Now with the blatant censorship acts of Google as well as the new privacy scandals that have come to light, I couldn't support them any more. I use Linux for a number of different reasons, but the main ones are that it's less of a headache, easy to manage, and more secure than both Microsoft and Google's platforms.</p>

  • MikeGalos

    12 September, 2018 - 1:34 am

    <p>Cool. I was at the dedication for the first Microsoft Canada headquarters building. We had a nice little party with BillG. </p>

    • pecosbob04

      12 September, 2018 - 8:13 am

      <blockquote><a href="#321133"><em>In reply to MikeGalos:</em></a><em>You old name dropper you!</em></blockquote><p><br></p>

  • waethorn

    12 September, 2018 - 2:23 pm

    <p>So they dropped how many beta testers, and they're just going to bring more jobs back?</p><p><br></p><p>What's telling is this contradiction:</p><p><br></p><p>"The company plans to offer more than 60,000 new jobs"…."grow staff by more than 500 full-time employees, with an additional 500 co-ops/internships by 2022"</p><p><br></p><p>So which is it? 60,000, or 500 plus how many part-time positions?</p>

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