Icahn Nabs AT&T’s Dallas HQ in Sale-Leaseback

Transferring its headquarters from San Antonio to Dallas, telecom giant AT&T Inc. has moved into a 37-story high-rise and sold the building in a sale-leaseback deal to Icahn Enterprises for an undisclosed amount. The new headquarters (pictured) had been owned by Southwestern Bell, a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T. The 1 million-square-foot building was originally constructed in 1982 and was acquired by Southwestern Bell purchased the building in 1985. Icahn Enterprises representatives declined comment on the deal, but an AT&T spokesperson confirmed the sale to Icahn, telling CPN, “This is a sale lease-back, which is very common for us. We’ve done it in St. Louis, Cleveland and Atlanta… we prefer to invest capital in assets with better growth opportunities.”About 700 hundred AT&T employees have already moved to the Dallas building. When the move is completed, AT&T will have about 14,400 workers in the Dallas area, making it the area’s second largest company. Moving to Dallas puts AT&T’s corporate headquarters near many of its key technology suppliers and other telecom companies that have major operations in the area, such as Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Ericsson, Nokia, Nortel and Samsung. AT&T Inc. is the largest communications holding company in the world by revenue. The company’s Telecom Operations group, which serves residential and regional business customers in 22 states, will remain in San Antonio. Icahn Enterprises L.P., formerly American Real Estate Partners L.P., is a diversified holding company engaged in a variety of businesses including real estate.