This article is fromWeChat official account: Economic Observer (ID: eeo-com-cn) , author: Ding Wenting (economic Observer reporter), title figure from the visual China

On November 2, a team of thousands of people by Bytedance settled in Fangheng Fashion Center, North Third Ring Road, Haidian District, Beijing, and officially opened the office. This is the first self-owned office building acquired by ByteDance for 5 billion yuan in 2019. Only one or three rings apart, Zhongkun Plaza, which was acquired by ByteDance for 9 billion yuan in 2018, has still not moved.

An industry insider revealed to the Economic Observer that Zhongkun Plaza’s debt and property rights are scattered among different merchants, making the transaction still pending.

The building area of ​​Zhongkun Plaza that ByteDance intends to acquire is 430,000 square meters. Behind the acquisition of large-area office buildings is the demand brought about by continuous expansion. At present, Bytedance has 33 office locations in Beijing, 29 of which are located in Haidian District. In addition to the headquarters in AVIC Plaza, the office areas are also scattered along Zhichun Road, Zhongguancun, Wudaokou, etc. The Economic Observer has learned that in 2018 and 2019 alone, Bytedance has rented nearly 200,000 square meters of area.

The demand for work positions by Bytedance is still growing. A few days ago, Bytedance said that it would open another 10,000 jobs before the end of the year. By then, the total number of Bytedance employees will exceed 100,000.

Actually, in the 8 years since Zhang Yiming founded Bytedance in Zhongguancun in 2012, from Jinqiu Home to Yingdu Building, to AVIC Plaza and China Satellite Building, Bytedance has never left Zhongguancun.

But finding office buildings in Zhongguancun has become increasingly difficult. A person familiar with the Beijing office market said that in the Zhongguancun business district, there is no problem if you want to lease an area of ​​2,000 to 3,000 square meters, and 10,000 square meters are okay, but you don’t need 50,000 square meters. In this case, spillover is inevitable.

In the past 10 years, companies stationed in Zhongguancun have gone to Houchang Village and Wangjing to seek larger office space. The pattern of Beijing’s Internet companies has gradually formed three major sectors: Zhongguancun, Houchangcun, and Wangjing, while JD.com faces each other in Yizhuang, Daxing.

For the Internet industry, the pattern is still changing. In 2019, Alibaba’s new Beijing headquarters, which is entrenched in Wangjing, officially laid the foundation in the North Expansion Area of ​​Chaoyang Park, Zhongguancun in the Laiguangying East Road area. In the first quarter of this year, Meituan also continued to expand its leases in the Guangying area.

In 2019, located on Zhichun Road, Haidian District, the veteran five-star Cui Gong Hotel with a history of more than 20 years was renewed and put on the brand name of “Jingdong Science and Technology Building”, which is regarded as an Internet company in the industry. An example of “returning” to Zhongguancun.

The property changes over the years have not only slowly unfolded a picture of the development and evolution of Internet companies taking root in Beijing and spending scattered leaves. From the perspective of the company itself, the purchase, lease and disposal of property assets for this type of company’s own use are actually It is also a major, named Corporate Real Estate, or CRE for short. Global companies such as DuPont and General Motors all have this professional department. For most companies in China, this is still a brand-new concept. Although it is the same as the abbreviation of Commercial Real Estate in English, the difference is that it is closely related to corporate management, especially for those with rapid expansion and scale. For companies in need, such as China’s Internet companies today, this is also a homework.

“get together” in Zhongguancun

One day in 2005, two young people from the Shenzhen Tencent headquarters came to the office of Zhao Mulan, a member of the Zhongguancun Management Committee at the time, and said that Tencent was looking for office buildings in Beijing and wanted to learn about office rental information.

See you in a week. They excitedly told Zhao Mulan that they had found the Yinke Building in the West District of Zhongguancun within a week and recruited 300 employees, ready to move in and start office. They told Zhao Mulan that this is unthinkable in Shenzhen, and that there are definitely less than 300 employees in a week.

The numerous research institutes and universities in Zhongguancun provide great convenience for recruiting talents. In fact, the intensive talent and intellectual resources of Zhongguancun laid the foundation for the emergence of the Internet in the early stage of reform and opening up.

In the early stage of reform and opening up, a group of scientific researchers broke through the constraints of the scientific research system and “goed to the sea” to establish private high-tech enterprises. The intellectual resources of Zhongguancun were on Baiyi Road.

All the way to the north

The crowded Zhongguancun has made Internet giants in need of expansion go northward. In 2009, Baidu, who had been lingering in Zhongguancun for many years, took the lead and ended the scattered offices in Putian Building, Ideal Building, Third Pole Building and other office buildings. It moved northward from outside the North Third Ring Road to the upper side outside the North Fifth Ring Road. The “Search Box” building, the new headquarters of the local science and technology park, covers an area of ​​90,000 square meters, enough to accommodate more than 7,000 Baidu employees.

However, in the days of Baidu’s rapid development, the number of employees expanded rapidly, and the “search box” building was quickly overcrowded. The Penghuan Building, Kuike Building, and Capital Space Building around Shangdi all left traces of Baidu.

In 2013 and 2014, the number of Baidu employees increased by 52% and 47% respectively. In 2012, the number of employees was just over 20,000, and in 2014 it more than doubled. It was also this year that Baidu Science and Technology Park was completed in the second phase of Zhongguancun Software Park, 3 kilometers west of the “Search Box” building. There are 5 buildings in Baidu Science and Technology Park, covering an area of ​​about 70,000 square meters.

Zhongguancun Software Park, located in the northeast corner of Beijing’s northwest corner, is also known as “Houchang Village”. This 2.6 square kilometers area is known as “the place with the highest unit economic output and intelligence density in China”. Ushered in NetEase, which moved from Wudaokou, in 2016, Sina, which has been rooted in Zhongguancun for 20 years, also moved from Huangzhuang, Haidian. A number of giants in the Chinese Internet industry have moved here one after another.

Continuously moving is the only way for almost all Internet companies to grow and develop.

Su Hua, the founder of Kuaishou, used an interesting analogy. The early Kuaishou was like a nomad, centered on Wudaokou, expanding the office area to new places every year or two.

In 2015, Kuaishou moved from a three-bedroom apartment in Huaqing Jiayuan to Block B of Tsinghua Science and Technology Park, 200 meters away. Although Kuaishou had a daily life of more than 10 million, it had only 20 employees. In just three years, the office area of ​​Kuaishou has spread to multiple buildings such as Tongfang Science and Technology Plaza and Wenjin International Hotel within 3 kilometers of Wudaokou. Different office areas have to be connected by shuttle buses. At the beginning of 2019, Kuaishou ended the “nomad” office and brought thousands of employees from the “universe”p>

The exit of the established communication companies not only leaves leased area but also a large number of high-tech talents. In 2014, with the completion of the new landmark Wangjing SOHO, Wangjing began to attract a large number of companies that had just received round A and B financing to settle in. The footprint of foreign companies faded and was replaced by the Internet. The three buildings of Wangjing SOHO are packed with hundreds of large and small Internet-related startups.

Pan Shiyi, the founder of SOHO China, said at the delivery of Wangjing SOHO that 90% of the enterprises in Wangjing SOHO are Internet companies.

In addition to the gathering of Internet companies, Wangjing was called the “O2O Universe Center” at that time. Chen Xueyuan, the president of “Site China”, remembers very clearly that a sentence circulating in the past two years was “Which app is not available in Wangjing SOHO Passing the road show, it’s like not on the market.”

The famous “Scan Code Street” was also born in Wangjing. Around 2015, a street about 100 meters between Wangjing SOHO Building 2 and Hopson Kylin Society was packed with ground-push booths. People passing by can get some paper towels, soap flowers and other small items by scanning the QR code and registering their account. gift. At that time, the “Scan Code One Street” was crowded with people and many stalls were pushed.

An intermediary who has been engaged in office leasing in Wangjing area for many years described the scene of those two years to the Economic Observer: The office buildings in Wangjing were not available, and a batch of companies that received financing moved in and rented 1,000 to 2,000 square meters. Meters of office space may soon be moved away due to a broken rent chain or poor management.

Although Wangjing’s companies continue to update and iterate, and the O2O craze has gradually faded, there are still some companies that are still standing. These include Meituan, which moved from Zhongguancun, and Alibaba, which bought two office buildings from 2015 to 2016.

In 2016, Ali spent 1.68 billion yuan to purchase Tower A of the Xiawangjing Greenland Center, and the following year it bought the Kuntai Jiarui Center. Both buildings are located in Wangjing. Prior to this, Alibaba had offices in Beijing Tonghui International, World Financial Center, Wanwang Building, etc. Among them, Tonghui International and the World Financial Center are both located in the core area of ​​the International Trade Center CBD, and the Wanwang Building is located between the West Second Ring Road and the Third Ring Road.

From 2015 to 2016, Alibaba brought tens of thousands of Alibaba employees to Wangjing, along with Alibaba’s UC, Youku, Alibaba Health, Alibaba Pictures, AutoNavi Maps and other businesses distributed in different office buildings. .

In addition to purchasing buildings, Ali has been expanding office space in Wangjing by leasing. According to a DTZ report, in 2017, Alibaba was in the new Jinhui Building adjacent to Wangjing Greenland Center and Kuntai Jiarui Center.sell. “

still expanding

Not long ago, Meituan leased another 14,000 square meters in the Tai Chi Industrial Park in Laiguangying in the first quarter of this year, and then leased another 30,000 square meters in the Rongxin Technology Building in the Laiguangying area. Office building.

Ali is also walking northward from Wangjing to Laiguangying. After launching the “Hangzhou + Beijing” dual headquarters strategy, in 2019, Ali selected the Beijing headquarters in the North Expansion Area of ​​Chaoyang Park, Zhongguancun. (North of Chaoyang District Electronics District), covering an area of ​​186 acres, with a total construction area of ​​470,000 square meters, and a total investment of 6.4 billion yuan. It is planned to be completed in 2024. It is planned to be stationed in Alibaba Dharma Academy, Alibaba Engineering Institute, Alibaba Entertainment, and Alibaba Health And other departments.

The Economic Observer learned that the Zhongguancun Chaoyang Park where Ali’s headquarters is located, as one of Zhongguancun’s current “One District Sixteen Parks”, also enjoys Zhongguancun related policies. In terms of supporting facilities, the four functional projects of the International Talent Apartment, the International Hospital, the 12-year consistent international school, and the permanent venue of the Future Forum “Three Internationals and One Future” have been determined.

Li Xiang, head of the North China Research Department of Savills, also told the Economic Observer, “The Chaoyang District Government attaches great importance to the Ali project. It has not only given some support for municipal facilities, but will also build a number of high-quality Talent apartment”.

In addition to government support, Alibaba’s new headquarters is only one subway stop away from Alibaba’s Alibaba Greenland Center. This also solves the commuting and moving problems of a large number of employees. An industry insider told the Economic Observer that, generally speaking, the relocation distance of a company is also an important consideration. Moving too far away from the previous office may result in the loss of a large number of employees. Before JD.com moved from Zhongguancun and Beichen to Yizhuang, There has been a clear wave of employee turnover.

JD, which “goes south” to Yizhuang, also chose to go north in 2019. It bought the Cui Gong Hotel on Zhichun Road for 2.7 billion and registered two companies, JD Cloud Computing and JD Hongyun Computing.

According to public information, the total construction area of ​​JD.com acquired by JD.com is about 68,600 square meters. From the point of view of construction area, JD.com’s headquarters is about 1/4 of JD’s headquarters. JD.com said, “The project It will be transformed into a technology research and development, business office-oriented, and become a carrier space for JD Group’s industrial development in Haidian District.”

At the time, Song Yang, the vice president of JD.com, also published a Moments explanation, “It’s not for opening a hotel or for the development of a conference, it’s just for office space.” He said that at present, some of the R&D talents of Jingdongbei Chen Building will move to Going to the Jade Palace Hotel is “more convenient for recruiting R&D talents.” And just three days ago (November 4), Bytedance announced that it would In the near future, we will spend another 10 billion yuan to find new office locations in Beijing.

This article comes fromWeChat official account: Economic Observer (ID: eeo-com-cn) , author: Ding Wenting (economic Observer reporter)