R3 doubles London office size for blockchain hiring spree, plans to build second engineering hub

Enterprise blockchain technology firm R3 has doubled the size of its London Wall office to make room for its growing engineering team, according to Mondo Visione.

“There is enormous opportunity for London post-Brexit. While there clearly remain some uncertainties, we believe the city is well placed and established to thrive in the coming years. That’s why we are confident in making this substantial long-term commitment now,” R3 CEO David E. Rutter, said.

As per the report, the maker of enterprise blockchain platform Corda is adding a second floor directly under the one it currently occupies in its London office to accommodate the 85 new employees it plans to onboard by the end of this year. Of the new hires, more than half will be assigned to London.

R3 is reportedly primarily hunting for software engineers, as well as commercial and client-facing professionals.

“R3 is committed to ensuring the technology underpinning Corda is cutting edge. To continue to do this, we need the very best people… As our software gains more use cases and across more sectors, we will be looking to invest further in top talent – London and elsewhere,” Rutter said.

The recent expansion is a cornerstone of R3’s rapid growth plans. The firm is purportedly eyeing to build a new engineering center early next year and is looking for a suitable location for it. The announcement of the proposed location will be revealed in the coming months. However, CoinDesk reported it will be in either the San Francisco Bay Area or another large European City. Possible alternatives include Dublin, Berlin, and Amsterdam.

In addition, Charley Cooper, R3 Managing Director, clarified that the second hub is not a secondary engineering center in terms of being low cost or comprising on quality, noting that the company would still follow the same hiring standards.

R3 has recently launched “Token SDK,” a developer tool kit that enables businesses to roll out tokens on its Corda blockchain platform. The SDK offers a standardized way of defining, issuing, using and trading the tokens.