TikTok may be eyeing further expansion in Dublin

20 Jan 2022

Image: © chathuporn/Stock.adobe.com

The social media sensation is said to be in talks for office space that would give it capacity for another 2,500 workers.

TikTok has been rapidly growing its Irish operations in recent years – and it looks like further expansion is on the cards.

Last year, the social media company signed a long-term lease for the Sorting Office in Dublin’s docklands, which has space for up to 2,000 employees.

But now, The Irish Times reports that TikTok is in talks to rent a further 257,000 sq ft of office space across two sites under development in the docklands area. This would reportedly give the company capacity for an additional 2,500 workers.

It was reported last summer that TikTok was on the hunt for space in the Irish capital on top of the Sorting Office deal, with a view to increasing its headcount by another 1,500.

But with the Sorting Office secured and a bigger search said to be underway, the company could have capacity to grow its Dublin-based workforce to nearly 5,000.

TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, set up a Dublin base in 2018. It has been on an expansion drive since then as the short-form video app has soared in popularity and reached around 1bn monthly active users globally.

In 2020, the Irish team was given responsibility for privacy oversight of European users and the company later announced that it would establish a European Transparency and Accountability Centre in Dublin.

Ireland was also selected as the location for TikTok’s first data centre in Europe.

The company’s Dublin headcount rapidly rose in 2020 and it planned to start 2021 with more than 1,100 employees. Last summer, it said it would further grow its headcount in Ireland with a new cybersecurity centre, creating more than 50 new roles.

There are currently nearly 300 jobs being advertised by TikTok for its Dublin base, with roles ranging from security specialists to a global head responsible for hate speech and hateful organisations.

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Sarah Harford was sub-editor of Silicon Republic

editorial@siliconrepublic.com