Apple plans to open an office in San Diego, California along with several other cities, company officials announced Thursday.
"We know that it's going to be in the UTC area in the middle of the prominent tech cluster already," said Matt Sanford, Director of Economic Development, SD Regional EDC.
Apple plans to build a $1 billion campus in Austin, Texas, that will create at least 5,000 jobs ranging from engineers to call-center agents while adding more luster to a Southwestern city that has already become a bustling tech hub.
The decision, announced Thursday, comes 11 months after Apple CEO Tim Cook disclosed plans to open a major office outside California on the heels of a massive tax cut on overseas profits, which prompted the company to bring about $250 billion back to the U.S.
"Ultimately having a big name like Apple is good for San Diego. Similar to Google being here, Teradata being here, Walmart labs and Amazon, it draws exposure to talent that San Diego is the place to be," Sanford said.
The company said it will also open offices in Seattle, and Culver City, California, each employing at least 1,000 workers over the next three years. Apple also pledged to add hundreds of jobs each in New York; Pittsburgh; Boston; Boulder, Colorado; and Portland, Oregon.
UC San Diego engineering student Samir Damle believes it would be great to work in an environment a company like Apple provides.
Local
"You don't have to relocate to the Bay Area after you graduate and have to leave San Diego to find a job," Damle said. "That's fantastic."
Mayunk Kurkrna, another engineering student at UC San Diego, is also interested in working for the company.
"They just make products so superior compared to others and I want to experience how the product development happens," Kurkrna said.
Read more about the company's overall announcement here.
The area near UC San Diego between the coast and Interstate 805 is known as the Golden Triangle. In the next four years, there will be at least 50 major public and private construction projects in this area, according to SANDAG.
You can view the current and future projects using this interactive map.
