Tech mega HQS

“Want to know when to sell? Look at the HQ,” wrote hedge-funder Andy Kessler in The Wall Street Journal recently, reflecting the old adage that blowing cash on lavish premises is a form of corporate hubris that often precedes a fall. And if that is the case, said Danny Fortson in The Sunday Times, Silicon Valley is in trouble. Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Google parent Alphabet are all in various stages of developing “mega-buildings” – vying with each other “for the most off-the-wall” approach.

Facebook’s new office, designed by Frank Gehry, “is topped by one of the world’s largest roof gardens”. Amazon has gone one better by building “a virtual colony” consisting of “three orbshaped biodomes” that will eventually cover ten blocks and offer space for 50,000 people. The idea is that “workers will be able to hold meetings in tree canopies built to resemble birds’ nests”. But outdoing them all is Apple’s “spaceship”, a new $5bn “shrine to the iphone”, designed by Norman Foster. When Steve Jobs pitched the design to planners in 2011, he said simply: “Apple is growing like a weed. It’s clear we need to build a new campus.” It must have been one of the rare moments when Jobs undersold his big idea. Since then, Apple’s stock value has trebled to $740bn, making it the world’s most valuable company. Not much sign of a downfall there – yet.