Apple plans 1st East Coast campus in NC

RALEIGH, N.C. — Apple is expanding spending in the United States and announced plans Monday to build its first East Coast campus — in North Carolina.

The iPhone maker is boosting U.S. spending to $430 billion over the next five years and doubling its hiring plans by 20,000 jobs. It had said it would spend $350 billion in January 2018, just after Congress approved a big tax overhaul that cut corporate taxes.

Apple says it is stepping up investment as the U.S. begins rebuilding from the COVID19 pandemic. The company for years has emphasized its role in the U.S. economy to help counter criticism about its reliance on overseas factories, often taking advantage of local tax breaks.

Apple will invest $1 billion in North Carolina and the campus, in the Raleigh-Durham area’s Research Triangle Park, is expected to bring at least 3,000 new jobs to the state in machine learning, artificial intelligence, software engineering and other fields.

The workers will have an average annual salary of about $185,000.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper said that once Apple creates the jobs, the tech giant will be eligible for incentives he considers “transformational.”

Under an agreement approved earlier Monday by a state incentives panel, Apple would get $846 million in cumulative cash payments over the next 39 years if the company meets job creation and investment thresholds.

The payments are calculated based on the income tax the state withholds from paychecks of the new workers.

The state Commerce Department estimates the project will generate nearly $2 billion in additional state revenues through 2061.

Cooper defended the hefty price tag on the incentives, arguing that Apple’s announcement will encourage other companies to move to North Carolina and have a positive ripple effect on local businesses in the Raleigh area.

“Once this campus is up and running, it’s expected to generate more than $1.5 billion a year in economic impact to our state,” Cooper said in a news conference Monday.

A summary of the incentives agreement notes the 3,000 jobs will be created from 2023 until 2032.