Silicon Valley’s LinkedIn Moves into Bigger Detroit Office

LinkedIn, a California-based social media platform designed for professionals, opened its new downtown Detroit office Wednesday.
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LinkedIn Detroit office
LinkedIn’s new Detroit office occupies the Sanders and Grinnell buildings at 1523 Woodward Ave. // Image courtesy of Bedrock

LinkedIn, a California-based social media platform designed for professionals, opened its new downtown Detroit office Wednesday.

The office is located at 1523 Woodward Ave. (north of Clifford Street) and spans 75,000 square feet in the historic Sanders and Grinnell buildings, which were designed by Albert Kahn. LinkedIn began its Detroit operations in a WeWork space in 2017 with 15 team members. It announced the move in April 2018 and had grown to 40 employees by then. Today, the office has 50 employees and is looking to hire more.

“We made a conscious decision to invest in Detroit because we believe we can have a meaningful impact on the local economy and put our money to work in a community that is rebuilding,” says Mike Gamson, senior vice president of global solutions for LinkedIn. “This is an important step to help level the playing field and further democratize access to jobs.”

Other technology companies that have chosen to either move or expand operations to Detroit include Waymo, WeWork, Google, Snap, Twitter, Microsoft, Amazon, Grand Circus, Uber, Pinterest, Quicken Loans, StockX, and others.

“LinkedIn knows as much as anyone about the importance of tying threads, so it only makes sense that they chose Detroit’s urban core for their next major regional office,” says Dan Gilbert, founder and chairman of Bedrock.

“LinkedIn’s move downtown is another example demonstrating that Detroit’s tech scene is rapidly growing, bringing with it established companies and start-ups alike, which in turn is attracting exceptional talent to the Motor City. And it’s that talent that is in turn attracting more of these types of exciting companies. In other words, it is the yin and yang of today’s global economy.”

The opening comes on the heels of Waymo’s announcement to locate its first factory completely dedicated to the mass production of autonomous cars in Detroit. UBS opened a new office at 1201/1217 Woodward Ave., and Bedrock purchased the Fowler Building at 1225 Woodward earlier this month. It will be renovated for retail.

H&M announced it would open a Detroit location this year, and the Shinola Hotel opened in January. The $1-billion Hudson’s Site development also is under construction.

The Sanders building once housed the hot fudge and ice cream company by the same name, and the Grinnell Bros. Music House once operated the world’s largest piano distributor out of the Grinnell building.

Bedrock is a full-service real estate firm specializing in acquiring, developing, leasing, financing, and managing commercial and residential buildings. It was founded in 2011.