Furthering its Southern California expansion, Google has inked a deal with the city of Beverly Hills to open a 13,465-square-foot office for the company’s entertainment division in a city-owned property.
The 11-year lease agreement, which is valued at $6.3 million, was approved by Beverly Hills City Council on Tuesday. It is expected that the Google will move into the building at 331 Foothill Rd. by the end of the year, once improvements to the office space are completed.
The deal is Google’s second notable Los Angeles-area real estate transaction in recent months. In January it signed a lease for more than 100,000 square feet of offices at three Venice properties, including the iconic Frank Gehry-designed Binoculars Building.
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Google has made several recent moves that signal its desire to get deeper into the entertainment business. In October it launched Google TV, an Internet-connected television platform. And today, the Wall Street Journal reported that the company plans to spend as much as $100 million for the creation of original content for new channels for its YouTube website.
According to a source with knowledge of the lease, the office will house YouTube staffers in addition to Google employees.
Film and television production company Participant Media and Beverly Hills’ cable station are both tenants at the Foothill Road building. The property is located in a former industrial section of Beverly Hills that the city is promoting as an entertainment business district. AOL, Netflix, Live Nation and independent film production company Lakeshore Entertainment also maintain offices in the area, which is just east of Beverly Hills City Hall.
Google declined to comment and its broker, Jeff Pion of CB Richard Ellis Group, could not immediately be reached for comment.
