A matchmaking site is helping to solve the lack of office space in Dublin
The Space Matchmakers initiative looks to link up startups and companies with some space to spare.
A NEW SITE has launched that aims to link up companies that have extra office space with startups struggling to find a place of work.
The Space Matchmakers initiative has been launched by the Dublin Commissioner for Startups, Niamh Bushnell. The website allows companies to post details of any space they have, how long it will be available for and what costs, if any, they want for the use of the space.
The commissioner will then look to connect any startups in the market for space with a suitable company. Startups in Dublin will be connected to available space on a case by case basis.
Bushnell said her office decided to launch the initiative due to repeated “anecdotal evidence” of small companies unable to find any suitable office space in the capital.
The issue of a lack of office space in the capital is one that has been repeatedly highlighted over the last year.
In September the Economic and Social Research Institute published research undertaken with commercial agents Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) that showed the vacancy rate for Dublin office space has fallen and is now at its lowest level since JLL began measuring the vacancy rate in 2001.
The available office space in Dublin fell from 8.3 million sq ft in 2010 to 3.3 million sq ft in the first half of 2015. This equates to a fall in the overall vacancy rate from 23.7% to 8.6%. Only 31% of the vacant stock was in the city centre where the vacancy rate was at 5.3%.
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“Crucial for startups”
Bushnell says it is crucial that startups are able to secure an office, and says that most small companies do not need much space in which to work.
“The thing people don’t get about startups is that they are extremely flexible about space. Once they have wifi, coffee and a few desks they are done,” she said.
“We want to make it easy for people who have space in the short term to announce it on the site and then we will connect them with startups.”
She added that the initiative has already seen some interest, saying: “We have had a couple of companies, both multinationals and startups, come to us (so far) and we are now exploring whether we can get the companies into a shared space.”
