The Google offices in Fulton Market currently house just over 800 employees, but the international tech company could be beefing up its presence in Chicago. According to Crain's, Google is searching for a city to host another major operations center that would house anywhere from 1,000 to 5,000 employees—the kind of people who might be turned off by the high cost of living at the company's West Coast offices. Reportedly, Chicago is just one of several cities (including Boston, Atlanta and Dallas) in the running for the offices, though both Google and City Hall refused to comment on the potential project.
If Google decides to build up its presence in Chicago, it has plenty of options for places to put its expanded workforce, including several new West Loop buildings in the works and a long list of developments that are being floated as potential sites for the second Amazon headquarters. Plus, if the tech giant has more people working in Chicago, it could finally signal the long-rumored arrival of super high-speed Google Fiber internet service in the city.