Damac plans new office and more staff in London

Damac Properties, a Dubai-based developer, is closing down four of its smaller offices in Glasgow, Southampton, Birmingham and Dublin to set up a bigger one in West London, a top company official said.

"The company is looking for a new headquarters in West London after growing out of its current headquarters in Canary Wharf, which will be used to meet extra sales capacity," said Damac Chief Executive Officer Peter Riddoch.

In a statement emailed to Emirates Business, the developer said it was planning to raise the number of its sales staff in the United Kingdom by 40 per cent over the next few months in order to meet the company's additional demand going beyond Middle East into North Africa and South East Asia. The Sunday Times reported that Damac had closed down its Irish office and its credibility was not enhanced when it emerged this month that it was marketing a resort in Iraq.

"Part of the plans include a new 5,000 square feet of showroom on Piccadilly in Central London to accommodate 40 staff and features a show apartment in addition to many displays and models of Damac's products. Showrooms in Manchester, Leicester, Chiswick and Canary Wharf will be enlarged to meet the extra internal capacity," said Riddoch.

"We have grown from 20 staff in 2007 to 105 with a plan to exceed 200 staff by the end of this year. The staff has been informed of our new plan and I am looking forward to seeing them choose their preferred new locations in this transfer. The new structure will create more opportunities and better career progression within the organisation and will allow us to align ourselves to our global business model with new, larger and more impressive offices to better showcase our products. Our new offices will have 30 to 40 sales staff to cater for the growing number of investors," Riddoch said.