“At what turned out to be his last public appearance, Steve Jobs stood before the Cupertino City Council on June 7, 2011, to present plans for a new corporate campus for Apple,” Peter Burrows reports for Businessweek. “Jobs noted, ‘there isn’t a straight piece of glass on the whole building … and as you know if you build things, this isn’t the cheapest way to build them.'”
“He had that right. Since 2011, the budget for Apple’s Campus 2 has ballooned from less than $3 billion to nearly $5 billion, according to five people close to the project who were not authorized to speak on the record,” Burrows reports. “If their consensus estimate is accurate, Apple’s expansion would eclipse the $3.9 billion being spent on the new World Trade Center complex in New York, and the new office space would run more than $1,500 per square foot—three times the cost of many top-of-the-line downtown corporate towers.”
Burrows reports, “Before his death, Jobs had hoped to break ground in 2012 and to move in by the end of 2015… At the company’s annual meeting on Feb. 27, Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said the move-in date has been pushed back to 2016. One reason for the new timetable, say three people who have spoken to Apple personnel about the project, is that the company has been working with lead architect Foster + Partners to cut $1 billion from the budget before proceeding.”
Tons more (6 square kilometers of curved glass!) in the full article – recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: While it’s not like Apple doesn’t have the money, perhaps they should have shaped the building not as a giant ring, but instead as an albatross?
Here’s Steve pitching the campus plans to the Cupertino City Council on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 at the Cupertino Community Hall:
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