Dive Brief:
- Google has revealed its plans to establish a new London headquarters near the city's iconic King's Cross station, according to Business Insider.
- This will be the company's first such campus built outside the U.S. and is expected to create at least 3,000 new jobs by the time it is completed in 2020. Google currently employs approximately 4,000 people in the U.K.
- Google currently operates out of a 380,000-square-foot leased space in London and is scheduled to move into another leased space in 2018. In addition to these buildings, the new headquarters will include a 10-story, 650,000-square-foot Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG)- and Heatherwick Studios-designed building, resulting in approximately 1 million square feet of space, according to Building Design + Construction.
Dive Insight:
At a time when many businesses are leaving the post-Brexit U.K., Google said it's "very optimistic" about the future of its U.K. business, although the decision to leave the European Union may have complicated its plans for the longer term. Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that the U.K. is a worthy investment because of the innovation taking place there, in addition to its skilled workforce and educational opportunities in the area of computer science. Google spent $1.6 billion on the land, which it purchased several years ago, but it shelved those plans for a new headquarters in search of a better option.
As far as Brexit's effect on the overall U.K. construction industry, it now faces the prospect of higher building costs and a deepening of the current skilled labor shortage, as E.U. tradesmen will no longer automatically be able to work in the U.K. In addition, the fate of non-British managers and design professionals, estimated to represent 40% of Britain's AEC payroll, is up in the air.
BIG also designed Google's new 600,000-square-foot building near its Mountain View, CA, headquarters. The building has been described as a "futuristic circus tent" because of a unique, opaque cover. The building will house 3,000 additional employees and tie into its existing campus. The new structure also includes photovoltaic solar panels for renewable energy, clerestories for natural light, native landscaping and bird-friendly design elements.