With rising house prices and living costs in the San Francisco Bay Area, affordability has become a major contributing factor to the exodus of many tech companies in Silicon Valley. While companies like Oracle and HP Enterprise have chosen to relocate their headquarters to Texas, others are making adjustments to office sizes. Let’s take a look at the how some tech giants are reacting to the exodus:
According to Surface, Google is expanding its office locations, “invest[ing] $7 billion in … data centers across the U.S.” and “plans to create 10,000 new full-time jobs” (Golenda). The expansion in Google’s data centers and offices, however, does not seem to suggest that it is completely moving out of Silicon Valley.
Google announced its plan to invest “$1 billion” (Golenda) in its San Francisco waterfront offices. While most tech companies in Silicon Valley are either downsizing existing offices in the San Francisco Bay Area, or relocating to cities with more affordable housing, Google does not seem to be following this trend as it is not only opening new offices, but also expanding its San Francisco locations.
Facebook is adjusting its hiring practices and transitioning to remote working. Mark Zuckerburg stated that limiting work locations when hiring “cuts out a lot of people who live in different communities, different backgrounds or may have different perspectives” (Frias), according to Insider. Do most Facebook employees prefer the work-from-home setting? Not necessarily. According to Wired, the results of “internal surveys” indicated that many “were eager to get back to the office” (Barber). Facebook’s transition to remote working will perhaps require long-term efforts, as Zuckerburg said that it “could take 10 years” (Barber) for a permanent transition to be possible.
In addition to opening up more positions to remote workers, Facebook, similar to Google, is expanding its current offices in the Bay Area. This includes a new office in Menlo Park “with space for 3,400 workers and 1,700 homes” (Frias).
Apple has begun to invest in new office locations in Texas, North Carolina, as well as expanding to Miami, New York, etc. (Gurman). It is clear that Apple is gradually moving out of Silicon Valley with Apple’s online services chief, Eddy Cue, and its head of custom silicon, Johny Srouji, pushing for this change (Gurman). Additionally, Apple has announced that after all workers return in-person, a “hybrid office”—three days per week of in-person working combined with remote working—will be implemented (Gurman).
Tech companies like Google, Facebook, and Apple have all made different adjustments to their hiring policies or work arrangements with the rise in housing prices in the San Francisco Bay Area and the exodus of many other companies from Silicon Valley. Will we see a transition to remote working in the near future? Or perhaps a combination of in-person and remote working?
References
Barber, Gregory. “If Work Is Going Remote, Why Is Big Tech Still Building?” Wired, 16 Feb. 2021, https://www.wired.com/story/work-going-remote-why-big-tech-building/
Frias, Lauren. “Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook employees who move out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts.” Insider, 21 May 2021, https://www.businessinsider.com/zuckerberg-facebook-salary-employees-moving-out-of-silicon-valley-2020-5
Golenda, Gabrielle. “Why Google Is Leaving Silicon Valley Behind.” Surface, 22 Mar. 2021, https://www.surfacemag.com/articles/why-google-is-leaving-silicon-valley/
Gurman, Mark. “Apple Decentralizes From Silicon Valley, but Workers Just Want to Be Remote.” Bloomberg, 4 July 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2021-07-04/apple-hq-is-no-longer-the-center-of-the-company-s-universe-kqpi2879#:~:text=As%20it%20keeps%20moving%20beyond,at%20home%20the%20other%20days.
Lowrey, Annie. “The Great Affordability Crisis Breaking America.” The Atlantic, 7 Feb. 2020, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/great-affordability-crisis-breaking-america/606046/
Vacar, Tom. “Silicon Valley exodus: Bay Area tech companies leaving for Texas.” KTVU, 14 Dec. 2020, https://www.ktvu.com/news/silicon-valley-exodus-bay-area-tech-companies-leaving-for-texas
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