Hyderabad Google campus will be huge, says Pichai

Hyderabad: Reiterating Google's commitment to the 'City of Pearls', Chennai-born Sundar Pichai, who was appointed Google Inc's CEO this August, on Wednesday announced that the company will be setting up a "huge" facility in Hyderabad. "Google is looking at hiring people for Bangalore and Hyderabad... We will also build a huge new campus in Hyderabad, to build capabilities," he said in New Delhi. The proposed facility, spread over two million sq feet, is expected to be the biggest one for Google outside US and it will be the first facility to be owned by the company in India. Google has four offices in India -- at Hyderabad, Bangalore, Gurgaon and Mumbai -- but all are leased properties. In May this year, a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to this effect was inked by Google's global head (facilities and workplaces) David Radcliffe and Telangana information technology and panchayat raj minister K T Rama Rao at the Google headquarters in Mountain View, California. The tech giant is expected to pump in Rs 1,000 crore to build this facility, which will lead to creation of over 6,500 additional jobs in the city. According to the Telangana government officials, the state had allocated 7.2 acres to Google at Gachibowli. "The company will spend about 12 months on planning and construction will start around the summer of 2016.Construction should take about two-and-a-half years and we could have a facility up and running as early as 2019," Radcliffe had said in May.   TOI