Facebook to open engineering office in NYC

Facebook will open an engineering center in New York City early next year.

Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg says the engineering office will be the company's first engineering office outside of the West Coast. She joined elected officials for the announcement Friday.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said West Coast tech companies "are finding that New York is the place they need to be."

Sen. Charles Schumer added that New York "is pleased to call Facebook a friend."

Facebook has had an office on Madison Avenue since 2009. It focuses mainly on advertising sales and employs around 100 people.

The engineering office will be led by Serkan Piantino. He previously managed the engineering team behind Facebook's News Feed and built the infrastructure behind Timeline.