Morningstar will move global headquarters to the Thompson Center, joining Google in the Loop

Morningstar, the Chicago investment research firm founded by Joe Mansueto, has picked the redeveloped James R. Thompson Center in the Loop for a new global headquarters, the company announced on September 30, 2026. The firm plans to lease more than 275,000 square feet in the former state office building at Randolph and LaSalle streets and move in late 2028, joining Google as a second anchor tenant.

The same day, Axios Chicago reported the deal as an exclusive, saying the move keeps one of the city’s largest homegrown companies and more than 1,500 employees in the Loop. Morningstar’s headquarters is now at 22 W. Washington St., across from the Daley Center.

The main points of the announcement, as reported by the company and by trade outlets, are below.

• The deal moves Morningstar’s global headquarters, and the new space will hold more than 1,500 Chicago employees.
• The lease covers more than 275,000 square feet, according to the company.
• The company plans to move in late 2028.
• The announcement lists the address as 171 N. LaSalle St., though the building has long used 100 W. Randolph St.
• The company is pairing the move with $5 million in grants to Chicago nonprofits over five years, starting in 2027.

What Morningstar confirmed and what the announcement left out

The move covers the whole headquarters and Morningstar’s Chicago staff. Bisnow reported that the new space will be similar in size to the company’s current footprint and that the move is tied to the end of Morningstar’s lease at 22 W. Washington St. In April, The Real Deal reported that Morningstar occupies roughly 263,000 square feet at that address under a lease that expires in 2029. Bisnow called the Thompson Center lease the largest downtown office deal of 2026 so far.

Morningstar employs roughly 11,000 people worldwide, Axios reported. The company’s most recent annual report counted 10,973 permanent full-time employees at the end of 2025 and said about half of the company’s roughly 497,000 square feet of US office space was at the Chicago headquarters.

Several details were not part of the announcement. Morningstar did not name the floors, the length of the lease or the rent. None of the coverage said what will happen to the space Morningstar leaves at 22 W. Washington St. When the talks were first reported in April, The Real Deal, citing CoStar, described Morningstar as negotiating for about 300,000 square feet on the building’s upper floors. Chicago YIMBY reported in September that Google will occupy the lower nine levels of office space, while the development team leases the upper levels, which come with their own terraces.

“As long-term investors, we believe in backing people and communities with enduring potential,” Morningstar CEO Kunal Kapoor said in the company’s announcement. Google’s Chicago site lead, Mike Miller, said in a statement quoted by Bisnow that pairing the two companies points to “a bright future for the next generation of Chicago talent.” Mayor Brandon Johnson said the move shows Morningstar’s continued confidence in the central business district and “the future of the LaSalle Street corridor,” according to Axios.

The nonprofit money is split two ways, according to Morningstar’s website. The Commercial Club Foundation gets $1 million for economic development work. The other $4 million, or $800,000 a year, goes through a new Morningstar Commitment to Chicago Fund run by United Way of Metro Chicago, for groups working on financial security and career advancement. The company says specific recipients will be announced later, and nonprofits that want to be considered can contact United Way of Metro Chicago for updates.

How Morningstar started and who runs the company

Mansueto started Morningstar in Chicago in 1984 with $80,000, Axios reported, and the company went public in 2005. Kapoor, who joined as a data analyst in 1997, became CEO in 2017, the same year Mansueto became executive chairman, according to the annual report. Mansueto owned about 37.5% of the company’s stock at the end of 2025. Outside the company, he bought the Wrigley Building in 2018, and the University of Chicago’s Mansueto Library carries his and his wife Rika’s name after a $25 million gift, Axios noted.

The lease lands in a soft office market. Bisnow reported in July that downtown office vacancy dipped to 24.3% in the second quarter of 2026, the first drop in two years, while the Central Loop, which includes the Thompson Center, had the worst numbers of any submarket, with about 737,000 square feet of negative net absorption for the year to that point.

How the state’s building ended up with Google

The Thompson Center opened in 1985 as the State of Illinois Center and was renamed in 1993 for former Gov. James R. Thompson, Axios reported. Helmut Jahn designed the 17-story, 1.2-million-square-foot building, which housed 50 state agencies, Capitol News Illinois reported. By 2022 the state faced a $325 million bill for deferred maintenance, WTTW reported. Preservation Chicago put the building on the group’s Chicago 7 Most Endangered list in 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2020, according to Preservation Chicago’s website.

The city cleared the way for a sale first. In May 2021, the City Council approved a zoning change introduced by Ald. Brendan Reilly of the 42nd Ward at Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s request, loosening size limits on the site to match most other Loop properties, WTTW reported. Chicago YIMBY reported that the change returned the block to DC-16, the city’s densest downtown zoning.

In late 2021, Pritzker announced a deal to sell the building to developer Prime Group for $70 million, with the state keeping 425,000 square feet for its own offices, according to WTTW. That plan changed in July 2022, when Google agreed to take the whole building. Under the final terms, JRTC Holdings, owned by Prime Group and Capri Investment Group, bought the building for an amount equal to $105 million: $30 million in cash plus the office tower at 115 S. LaSalle St., valued at $75 million, according to the governor’s office. About 1,800 state workers were slated to move to the LaSalle Street tower. Pritzker called Google’s announcement “a massive win for the city of Chicago,” WTTW reported, and said the agreement would save taxpayers nearly $1 billion over 30 years.

The setup is a build-to-suit. Prime and Capri are renovating the building, and Google agreed in 2022 to buy the finished building for $105 million, according to Google’s announcement at the time. Prime Group’s Michael Reschke said the state would own 50 percent more space on LaSalle Street “at 50 percent less cost,” Capitol News Illinois reported. ABC7 described the arrangement the same way in 2024, saying Google intends to buy the building once renovations are complete.

The renovation and Google’s timeline

Work on the building started the week of April 1, 2024, and Pritzker, Johnson and Google officials marked the start of construction that spring, ABC7 reported. ABC7 put the project at $280 million and said Google expects to move about 2,000 employees in once the work is done. Jahn’s architecture firm is back to lead the redesign, and work has been underway since 2024, Urbanize Chicago reported. Google is expected to use at least 600,000 of the building’s 954,000 renovated square feet, according to Bisnow.

Google’s move-in date has slipped more than once. The company first targeted 2026, then 2027, and in September said the building will open to employees, tenants and the public in 2028, Bisnow reported. Google did not give a reason for the delay. Here is what the latest plans call for.

• Crews are re-cladding the building in newer multi-pane glass and addressing its climate control problems, Chicago YIMBY reported.
• The 17-story atrium stays public, with a cascading staircase and terraced seating down to the lower level, where the floor rosette will be preserved, according to Chicago YIMBY and Urbanize Chicago.
• The two lower levels will hold about 60,000 square feet of commercial space across 14 spaces, according to Chicago YIMBY.
• A 30-foot sculpture by artist Sanford Biggers, titled Vector, is planned for the Randolph Street entrance, Axios reported.
• Google plans to open the building in 2028, and Morningstar plans to move in late 2028.

Getting there: the Clark/Lake station

The Thompson Center connects directly to the CTA’s Clark/Lake station, and ABC7 reported that the station would stay open throughout construction. The station averages more than 9,100 weekday entries and connects six rail lines, Urbanize Chicago reported in 2024, when the Chicago Transit Board approved moving the station’s main entrance from Lake Street, under the L tracks, to the northeast corner on Clark Street. The developer is paying for the new entrance and mezzanine finishes, and the CTA planned $10 million in platform improvements, with work scheduled in phases through late 2026, according to the CTA. In September, Chicago YIMBY reported that the station’s renovation had begun and is timed to the building’s reopening. WBEZ noted that riders can reach both airports from the station.

These are the lines that stop at Clark/Lake, according to the CTA’s station page.

• Blue Line trains stop on the subway platform.
• Brown, Green, Orange and Pink Line trains stop on the Loop ‘L’ platform.
• Purple Line Express trains stop at the station only during weekday rush periods, according to the CTA.
• The station is listed as accessible and has a street address of 124 W. Lake St.

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