Blizzard Entertainment Inc. has quietly inked a new lease for its headquarters in the Irvine Spectrum in a deal that looks likely to keep Orange County’s largest software company in its present location through at least the end of the decade.
The company, whose World of Warcraft series has made it the world’s largest online game company, recently signed a lease renewal for its three-building headquarters at the Alton Corporate Center, at Alton Parkway and Laguna Canyon Road.
The iron-gated complex, owned by Newport Beach-based Irvine Company, counts about 235,000 square feet of office space. Blizzard has been at the campus—the former home of chipmaker Broadcom Corp.—since 2007.
The distinctive property counts a Blizzard library, museum, cafeteria and a giant statue of an orc—a fictional character from one of its games—among other features.
The renewal, signed at the end of 2012, was the largest office lease in OC last year, according to brokerage data (see Top Deals Special Report, starting on page 21).
Irvine Co. executives confirmed the size of the deal but declined to discuss other terms of the lease.
Sources familiar with the deal said the new lease runs about seven years.
Other Buildings
Brokerage data also show Blizzard recently renewing leases in a trio of buildings it occupies across the street from its headquarters at the Irvine Oaks office campus. Those leases total about 116,000 square feet of office space.
The renewals appear to put on hold any thoughts of a new office development for Blizzard, a unit of Santa Monica-based parent Activision, itself part of Paris-based Vivendi SA.
The company was rumored to be exploring the possibility of building its own office campus in or around Irvine as recently as last year. Estimates on the size of the would-be complex ran as high as 1 million square feet, nearly twice the space the company currently occupies in Irvine.
An office development approaching 1 million square feet in size hasn’t been built in OC since Broadcom moved to its current headquarters in University Research Park about seven years ago.
Office development might not be in the cards for Blizzard in the near term, but the company is on a hiring push, according to Chief Executive Mike Morhaime.
“We’re always trying to plan for the future and make sure we have the right facilities and combinations to continue what we need to do,” Morhaime said during an interview last week at the company’s launch event for StarCraft II: Hearts of the Swarm. “We’re still growing.”
The company is estimated to employ about 1,700 people in OC. Blizzard lists more than 110 jobs openings in Irvine on its website, including a handful of software engineers and designers, and a game producer position listed under “Next Gen MMO.”
Morhaime declined to disclose specifics on its plans in Irvine or its recent real estate transactions.
“We have very ambitious plans, but I really can’t talk about the growth,” Morhaime said.
“We definitely expanded across the street,” he said of the company operations at the Irvine Oaks office campus.
The growth plans could have been prompted by a series of recent developments at Blizzard.
The company has a new multiplayer online role-playing playing game in the works and firmly under wraps, with a code name of Titan.
It has taken out numerous domain names, including the most recent Project Blackstone, which could be linked to the new game.
The domain name also could signal the next World of Warcraft expansion title, a future game or nothing at all.
Blizzard last month signed a deal with Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. to make its popular Diablo III game available for the PlayStation 3 console this month.
The two companies did not provide financial details of their agreement, which marked the first time a Blizzard title was not solely geared for a PC or online play.
BlizzCon
Another sign of good times for Blizzard: Last month the company announced a return of its BlizzCon fan fest, which will be held at the Anaheim Convention Center in November.
The company canceled the high-profile event last year for the first time since its inaugural run in 2005, a cancellation attributed to a need to focus on several versions of games in development at the time.
Blizzard reported sales of $1.6 billion in 2012, up 29% from 2011. Operating income topped $717 million, up 45%.
Last year Blizzard released Diablo III and its fourth World of Warcraft expansion set, Mists of Pandaria.
