Wifi fails at new Google campus

WHEN Google opened its latest “campus” in Silicon Valley in 2022, it boasted about the building’s spaceage design and high-tech features including a roof made entirely of solar panels.

But employees at the office have a more prosaic complaint: the internet giant’s wifi does not work.

Multiple employees speaking to Reuters complained for several months that their laptops have been unable to connect to wifi.

Some staff have suggested the issues are related to the building’s billowing roof, which is made up of a “dragonscale” design of 90,000 silver solar panels and may be responsible for trapping wireless signals.

Employees can plug into wired internet connections at their desks on the ground floor, designed for “focused work”. But when they take their laptops to the office’s first floor, which has comfortable chairs for meetings and “collaborative” work, many find they are unable to access wireless internet.

Google has issued some staff with laptops featuring more powerful wifi receivers while others have been encouraged to sit outside at the office’s cafe, where there are stronger connections.

Others have taken to using their phone’s mobile signal as a hotspot rather than relying on the company’s wifi.

The spotty internet signals have jeopardised Google’s effort to get staff to return to the office three days a week, some employees said.

A Google spokesman told Reuters: “We’ve had wifi connectivity issues in Bay View.” He added that the company had made several improvements to address the issue.

Google’s Bay View campus, which sits near its head- quarters, is described by the company as the first built by the business itself from the ground up. It is powered by solar and wind energy 90pc of the time and is designed so that every employee has a window view.

It was designed by the Danish architects Bjarke Ingels Group and Heatherwick Studio, run by the English designer Thomas Heatherwick.

It houses around 4,000 staff including those working on its latest artificial intelligence systems.