Zopa has become the latest fintech to expand its presence in Canary Wharf with plans to double its office footprint in the financial district.
The new location, in Water Street, will bring the company’s London footprint to 44,000 sq. Ft.
The fintech, keen to make a splash among its banking peers in the financial hub, plans to stick a neon Zopa sign at the top of the 13-storey skyscraper.
Zopa will be joining a host of major banks with a footprint in Canary Wharf, from institutional names like Barclays, JP Morgan Chase and Deutsche Bank to Britain’s biggest digital bank (by valuation and customer base) Revolut.
Iain Kendrick, chief people officer at Zopa, described the move as a “statement of intent as we change the face of banking in a location previously dominated by the UK’s established banking players”.
Kendrick said: “Our relocation to a brand-new headquarters at 20 Water Street in the heart of Canary Wharf marks a major milestone in Zopa’s growth journey.”
Though challenger banks seem increasingly interested in presenting themselves alongside the legacy banks in Canary Wharf, Zopa won’t be spending long as the neighbour of a certain banking giant, HSBC, which is leaving the district in the next two years, having first stablished its base there back in 2002.
Canary Wharf real estate doesn’t come cheap – the average cost of office rentals in the area is between £30 and £55 per sq. Ft – and given the hefty investment, there could be significant pressure on management to encourage its more than 800-strong workforce to make full use of the space.
Despite this, a Zopa spokesperson told UKTN the company is and will remain a “hybrid working organisation”.
“Zopa values the balance of providing our people flexibility while retaining the benefits of in-person working.”
It doesn’t hurt that Zopa secured £68m in equity funding a few months ago, nor that it swung to its first full year of profit in the year ended December 2023, pulling in a pre-tax profit of £15.8m.
The bank’s statement echoes a recent declaration from Revolut boss Nikolay Storonsky that it would be protecting its hybrid work policy, despite a number of legacy banks issuing back-to-office orders.