Facebook rumoured for US office homecoming

Social networking giant Facebook has been caught scouting locations in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to find 7,000 sq ft of office space in order to expand their presence in the locality, according to a report from the Boston Business Journal.

Mark Zuckerburg’s company – worth $66bn after going public last year – intends to use the offices in Kendall Square to house around 36 software engineers, set to be employed over the next six months.

With four employees already housed in temporary office accommodation on 711 Atlantic Avenue, one as-yet unnamed source was quoted as saying: “They want to have a larger footprint here. They want to be near MIT to recruit staff and they want to be next to similar firms.”

According to the source, real estate agents Knight Frank and Newmark Grubb will be representing Facebook throughout the search, with the Cambridge Center and One Kendall Square hotly tipped as the most likely destinations.

The move would put Facebook within the immediate vicinity of some of the most powerful technology companies in the world, including Microsoft, Google and Nokia. The company, founded locally by a group of students at Harvard University, currently base the majority of their operations at the technology hub of Silicon Valley, California.

After Harvard, Facebook employees moved from Stuart Street, Boston, into the Student Advantage offices just a few miles away in 2005. Having built up a personal affinity with the city for its role in the company’s creation, the company left a year later in order to consolidate their operations in the fertile Californian environment. Outside of the US, the social media moguls have set up satellite facilities in Dublin, Ireland and Hyderabad, India.

All parties refused to comment on proceedings.