Look out Menlo Park City residents, you may be getting a new neighbor soon - the big, bad Facebook (News - Alert) empire.
Mark Zuckerberg’s $50-billion empire may be getting a whole host of new neighbors as word is spreading that the company is saying “goodbye” to its leased space on S. California Avenue and 1050 Page Mill Road in Palo Alto (News - Alert), Calif, and “hello” to Sun Microsystems old headquarters. The new location boasts 11 buildings, 57 acres and one million square feet of property, according to a TechCrunch article.
Various press agencies including Agence France, ABC 7 and TechCrunch gathered at Menlo Park City Hall today as Facebook announced its plans for a new location. Company representatives also noted that they are looking to add more faces to the 2,000 plus company.
According to David Ebersman, CFO of Facebook, the new building can fit 3,600 and offers 3,700 parking spaces, and Facebook Head of Real Estate John Tenanes said that it could hold, “Even more,” TechCrunch reports. Facebook is expected to start making the new building its home this summer.
Facebook could probably make good use of its new space as the social media site shows no signs of slowing down. Facebook has more than 500 million active users who spend more than 700 billion minutes per month on it, according to the site. The company, which has more than 2,000 employees, reports that 70 percent of Facebook users are outside the United States
Zuckerberg’s company certinaly has the means to buy a new space as Facebook recently raised $1 billion from non-United States investors which, when combined with an infusion from Goldman Sachs and Russia's Digital Sky Technologies last December, brought its latest round of fund-raising to $1.5 billion.
As the Facebook domination continues, businesses are still asking, “When will Facebook have an initial public offering (IPO)?”
The answer, according to many, is during the summer of 2012, according to the Associated Press (News - Alert). Zuckerberg, who conceptualized the idea of Facebook in his Harvard University dorm room one night, expects to have more than 500 shareholders at some point this year. That fact may propel Zuckerberg to lead the company’s IPO.
So while non-California residents ponder the IPO Facebook fate, perhaps Menlo Park City residents can spend time figuring out how to increase their odds for a Zuckerberg spotting.
Carrie Schmelkin is a Web Editor for TMCnet. Previously, she worked as Assistant Editor at the New Canaan Advertiser, a 102-year-old weekly newspaper, covering news and enhancing the publication�s social media initiaitives. Carrie holds a bachelor�s degree in journalism and a bachelor�s degree in English from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.
Edited by Carrie Schmelkin