The proposed Google corporate headquarters in Mountain View, California, is pictured in this artist's rendering courtesy of NBBJ. While much of corporate America is retrenching on the real estate front, the four most influential technology companies in America, including Google, are each planning headquarters that could win a Pritzker Architecture Prize for hubris. Google Inc, the world's largest Internet search company, has outgrown its original headquarters in Silicon Valley's Mountain View and is planning to build a 1.1 million square foot Googleplex nearby.
In this Friday, May 24, 2013 photo, a student throws trash into a solar energy-powered garbage bin created by Ecube Labs CEO Kwon Sunbeom at the Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. Instead, while his peers were seeking jobs at Samsung and LG, Kwon scaled back his studies and started a company with friends. Together they invented a garbage bin that compresses rubbish using solar power and wirelessly communicates to be collected when full. Using 50 million won ($44,000) of their own money and channeling the business in a garage spirit that made Silicon Valley famous, they lived for a month in a shabby factory without air conditioning, subsisting on instant noodles, to make their first prototype. So far they have sold 31 of their Smart Bins to universities in Seoul and another 12 to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Construction for the new San Francisco 49ers football stadium is shown in Santa Clara, Calif., Friday, May 24, 2013. Goodbye grungy, cold Candlestick Park. Hello high tech, glittering, Levi's Stadium. Fifty-four years after $32 million Candlestick Park opened, the 49ers are building a new $1.2 billion showcase of a stadium which is almost twice as big, wired to the hilt, and opening its doors just in time to host Superbowl 50 in the heart of the Silicon Valley.
In this May 24, 2013 photo, San Francisco 49ers employee Talia Malik walks on the construction site of the field for the 49ers new football stadium in Santa Clara, Calif. Goodbye grungy, cold Candlestick Park. Hello high tech, glittering, Levi's Stadium. Fifty-four years after $32 million Candlestick Park opened, the 49ers are building a new $1.2 billion showcase of a stadium which is almost twice as big, wired to the hilt, and opening its doors just in time to host Superbowl 50 in the heart of the Silicon Valley.
San Francisco 49ers project executive Jack Hill looks over the field at the new San Francisco 49ers football stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., Friday, May 24, 2013. Goodbye grungy, cold Candlestick Park. Hello high tech, glittering, Levi's Stadium. Fifty-four years after $32 million Candlestick Park opened, the 49ers are building a new $1.2 billion showcase of a stadium which is almost twice as big, wired to the hilt, and opening its doors just in time to host Superbowl 50 in the heart of the Silicon Valley.
Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson thanks Kings fans for their support during the Long Live The Sacramento Kings rally in Sacramento, Calif., Thursday, May 23, 2013. Thousands of Kings fans flocked to Cesar Chavez Park to celebrate the sell of the team to Silicon Valley entrepreneur Vivek Ranadive and a group of investors who promised to keep the team in Sacramento.
