WHOSE SILICON VALLEY FOOTPRINT'S GROWING FASTEST

by Mary Ann Azevedo
Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal

Search giant Google and cloud computing pioneer VMware have laid claim to more space in the Bay Area since 2009 than any other tech company, according to a Grubb & Ellis report on Friday.

The firm's managing director, Richard Scott, spoke at the Business Journal's Economic Forecast breakfast Friday about the biggest tech office/R&D space users in Silicon Valley and who has taken the most space since 2009.

While Cisco Systems has by far the biggest CRE footprint in the valley with nearly 7 million square feet, the San Jose networking equipment giant has absorbed very little new space since 2009.

Meanwhile, VMware has done most of its leasing or acquiring of space after 2009 although it was founded in 1998.

As of mid-October 2011, Google had leased or bought about 1.42 million square feet of space and VMware had leased or bought about 1.4 million square feet of space in the Bay Area since 2009 – more than social networking giant Facebook and even more than Apple, which has seen demand for its products explode in recent years.

In the spring of 2011, VMware took over more than 1 million square feet former Roche campus in Palo Alto’s Stanford Research Park. Over the year, Google bought or leased dozens of buildings in Mountain View. And Apple slowly leased up nearly all the available space in Cupertino.

"Apple owns Cupertino. Google owns Mountain View," Scott said. "Now they’re spilling into Sunnyvale."

Looking ahead, he predicted that as Facebook continues to grow beyond its Menlo Park campus, it may end up migrating to the Ardenwood/Fremont area.

"At the end of the day because these movers and shakers are so dynamic and big, they have more to say as to what happens over the next year than any other indicator," Scott said. "And all this activity are signs that they want to stay here."