JLL (company)

JLL is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, and it is the second-largest public brokerage firm in the world.[5][6] The company has approximately 91,000 employees in 80 countries, as of 2019.[7]

Services include sales and leasing, property management, project management, and development.[8] In 2014, the organization shortened its name to JLL for marketing purposes, while the legal name remained Jones Lang LaSalle Incorporated.[9][10]

Former company president Christian Ulbrich succeeded Colin Dyer as CEO in October 2016.[11] Stephanie Plaines was the CFO, as of March 2019.[12] Sheila Penrose has served as board chairperson since 2005.[13][14]

The company began as the result of a 1999 merger of Jones Lang Wootton and LaSalle Partners.[8][15] Jones Lang Wootton was a London auctioneer that originated in the 1700s.[8] By 1976, Jones Lang Wootton expanded into the United States real estate market in New York City.[16] The company had 4,000 employees in 33 countries around the time of the merger with LaSalle Partners.[17]

William Sanders founded real estate company International Development Corp in 1966 in El Paso, Texas.[18][19] Sanders renamed the company LaSalle Partners in 1968 and relocated to Chicago, Illinois.[18] The company first offered investment banking, investment management, and land services.[6] By 1997, LaSalle had grown into three business divisions, Management Services, Corporate and Financial Services, and Investment Management, with ten U.S. corporate offices and seven international offices.[6] LaSalle Partners made an initial public offering in 1996.[6]

LaSalle Partners and Jones Lang Wootton merged to form Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) in 1999 in a $435 million deal.[15][20]

JLL purchased The Staubach Company in 2008.[11] Roger Staubach served as executive chairman of JLL from 2008 until he retired in 2018.[5] JLL merged with UK-based King Sturge in a £197 million deal in 2011.[21] The combined business, with 2,700 employees and 43 offices, created the largest property agent in the UK, as reported by The Telegraph in 2011.[21] The company acquired UK-based Guardian Property Asset Management in 2015.[22] LaSalle Investment Management, a subsidiary of JLL, managed $58 billion in real estate investments for institutional and retail clients, as of 2016.[8] JLL had acquired 80 companies and established 100 offices worldwide by 2016.[11]

The company expanded from commercial real estate services to include property technology or "proptech", with the 2017 launch of its JLL Spark division.[23] In early 2018, the division acquired Stessa, a portfolio management company.[24] In June 2018, JLL Spark created a $100 million venture fund to invest in real estate start-ups, such as a technology to link office users with co-working spaces.[25]

JLL announced the acquisition of HFF in a deal worth $2 billion in March 2019.[26] The acquisition was completed in July 2019 and worth $1.8 billion.[27]

• CBRE Group
• Colliers International
• Cushman & Wakefield