Hitachi and ABB, the 7,000 sqm Vacancy That Wasn’t a Goodbye

In the third quarter of 2026, Hitachi signed a three-year lease for more than 650 square meters of office space in Tower A of Samara Satélite, in Naucalpan, State of Mexico. The agreed rent differs by less than 5% from rents negotiated in other transactions completed in June and July in the same building, where rents are up to 21% above the average asking rent in the Norte submarket¹, according to SiiLA data.

The new location adds to a network of at least seven offices the company and its subsidiaries—GlobalLogic, Hitachi Energy, Hitachi High-Tech, Hitachi Industrial Equipment and Hitachi Vantara—already had in Mexico. Together, these locations cover approximately 3,200 square meters across Mexico City and the states of Mexico, Guanajuato, Jalisco and San Luis Potosí.

The Norte submarket is particularly important to Hitachi not only because it accounts for about one-third of the space the group occupies in Mexico, but also because of its long-standing real estate presence in the area.

That history dates back to Hitachi’s acquisition of ABB’s power grids business, which began in 2020 and led to the creation of Hitachi Energy. Between that year and 2025, ABB vacated nearly 7,000 square meters in Tower I of Corporativo Humboldt, and a portion of that space, approximately 600 square meters, began appearing under Hitachi Energy’s name, according to SiiLA records.

The reorganization also showed up in Norte’s office market, where ABB’s vacancies contributed to an approximately 93% decline in space occupied by electric power companies between the third quarter of 2023 and the same period in 2026. However, because this sector accounts for less than 1% of the submarket’s occupied space, the case matters less for its market impact than for what it reveals about the real estate decisions of a global company that continues leasing offices in the area after that reorganization.

As of the third quarter of 2026, Norte’s office vacancy rate was 36.6%, more than twice the average for the Mexico City metropolitan area. Despite the abundance of available space and the submarket going nearly two years without adding new buildings, Hitachi signed a new lease in a tower with rents above Norte’s average. The transaction suggests that vacancies associated with a corporate reorganization do not necessarily indicate a loss of interest in the market where they occur, as a reduction in occupied space during that process can coexist with new office leases in the same area. At the same time, it shows that even in a market with substantial available supply, certain properties continue to attract tenants at relatively high rents, and elevated vacancy does not necessarily translate into a decline in the submarket’s average asking rent².

In both respects, Hitachi’s lease shows that aggregate market indicators do not always allow you to reconstruct the real estate decisions of the companies occupying a market or the specific conditions of the buildings where they choose to locate.

To explore differences in occupancy, vacancy and rents among buildings within the same market, visit SiiLA Market Analytics or email us at contacto@siila.com.mx.

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¹ According to SiiLA’s boundaries, the Norte submarket includes portions of the real estate corridors in Naucalpan, Tlalnepantla de Baz and Atizapán de Zaragoza, in the State of Mexico.

² Between the fourth quarter of 2018 and the third quarter of 2026, Norte’s office vacancy rate increased from 26.0% to 36.6%, while the average asking rent rose 18.1%. An analysis of 32 quarterly observations, using regressions with Newey-West robust standard errors, found no statistically significant relationship between the two variables. These results do not rule out the possibility that vacancy puts downward pressure on rents, nor do they necessarily reflect the rents actually agreed upon in lease transactions.