By Olivia Pulsinelli – Assistant managing editor, Houston Business Journal
Oct 22, 2021, 4:06pm EDT
Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), which employs thousands of people in the Houston area, reportedly is closing two of its local office towers.
According to an internal memo seen by Bloomberg, the energy giant will move workers from its offices in the Hughes Landing mixed-use district in The Woodlands to its main Houston-area campus in City Place, formerly Springwoods Village.
“We look forward to bringing our teams together and having them collaborate on the Houston campus,” Exxon said in an Oct. 22 email, per Bloomberg.
Exxon leased about 478,000 square feet in Hughes Landing in 2013, and Montgomery County Commissioners approved two 10-year, 100% property tax abatements for the buildings. The Woodlands Township provided a similar incentive, but that tax abatement was terminated earlier this month, Community Impact reported. The company was struggling to meet a requirement to have at least 470 employees at one building and 960 at another.
Exxon was supposed to create 1,430 jobs across the two buildings, according to 2013 reports. Now, Exxon will pay just over $1.1 million in back taxes to the township for the two buildings, per Community Impact.
“We entered the tax abatement agreement a while ago. ... With our recent economic financial results for the corporation, we are going through significant shifts with a focus on reducing costs,” Kevin Gerrity, Exxon's global strategy manager, said at a special Oct. 11 meeting of The Woodlands board of directors, per Community Impact.
Late last year, Exxon revealed plans to cut about 1,900 U.S. jobs through voluntary and involuntary programs, with the largest portion coming from the Houston area. That included laying off 677 people at Exxon's 385-acre campus in the master-planned community now called City Place, with another 45 spread across the company's Hughes Landing offices.
"The workforce reductions are the result of ongoing reorganizations and work-process changes that have been made over the past several years to improve efficiency and reduce costs," Exxon said in October 2020. "These actions will improve the company’s long-term cost competitiveness and ensure the company manages through the current unprecedented market conditions. The impact of Covid-19 on the demand for ExxonMobil’s products has increased the urgency of the ongoing efficiency work."
Through 2021, Exxon expected to reduce its global workforce by about 15%, or about 14,000 jobs, including employees and contractors.