14 DAY TRIAL // With $178 billion (€157 billion) in the bank, money is the last thing on Apple’s mind. No one should be surprised that the company is spending a whopping $2 billion (€1.7 billion) to convert the failed sapphire plant in Mesa, Arizona, into a data center.
That’s news from Kristin Huguet, a spokeswoman for Apple, who wrote in an e-mail statement on Monday, “We’re proud to continue investing in the U.S. with a new data center in Arizona, which will serve as a command center for our global networks. This multibillion-dollar project is one of the largest investments we’ve ever made.”
Everybody wins
Still a huge sapphire-cooking factory, the facility will remain usable by GT Advanced until December of this year. Apple and GT have settled their legal dispute, following a failed partnership, and the sapphire maker seems pleased with the outcome.
Apple, for its part, is also content with investing no less than $2 billion (€1.7 billion) to resurrect the facility and repurpose it. However, it should be noted that Apple probably already had plans for this new command center, so this could be quite convenient for the Mac maker.
Arizona stands to benefit from the move as well. Governor Doug Ducey tells Bloomberg in a phone interview that Apple’s data center will employ 150 people full-time and will further create 300 to 500 construction and trade jobs.
Best of all, the plant will be powered entirely by renewable energy, and that Apple plans to build and finance solar projects that will end up powering more than 14,500 Arizona homes.
Apple currently has several data centers scattered around the United States. The most publicized of all such facilities is the one located in Reno, Nevada (next door to one of Facebook’s own data centers). Apple brags about its efforts to run clean data centers over at its Environment site.