Apple set to open its first office in Cambridge

PanARMENIAN.Net - Iconic global technology company Apple is set to open its first office in Cambridge, the UK’s innovation capital, in the next few weeks, the Business Weekly reports.

With a market cap of over $630 billion, almost 100,000 employees and net 2014 sales of around $183bn, Apple would be the biggest feather in the Cambridge cluster’s cap to date.

The Californian-based business is believed to have identified 90 Hills Road for its Cambridge city centre offices and R & D function. With Grade A office space at a premium in Cambridge, the U.S. giant would probably start with around 20 staff but have capacity to gear up to as many as 40 in that space, the report says.

With Qualcomm determined to scale up its Cambridge operations with the $2.5bn acquisition of CSR, Huawei pledging major investment in the city after swallowing Neul, and Microsoft already growing from its new HQ near the rail station, Apple’s arrival will prove transformational for the cluster – evidencing the rising kudos of Cambridge in Silicon Valley, it says.

Apple recently announced its results for its fiscal 2014 fourth quarter ended September 27. It posted quarterly revenues of $42.1bn and quarterly net profit of $8.5bn – comfortably ahead year-on-year.

Apple is forecasting revenues of between $63.5bn and $66.5bn for its fiscal 2015 first quarter.

CEO Tim Cook described 2014 as “one for the record books” with the biggest iPhone launch ever with iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.

He said that with innovations in its new iPhones, iPads and Macs, as well as iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite, Apple boasted its “strongest product lineup ever. We are also incredibly excited about Apple Watch and other great products and services in the pipeline for 2015.”

Music streaming world-leader Spotify, which has had a Cambridge contact center for the last three years, is also believed to be scaling up in the city. The $1bn Anglo-Swedish business is already strong in London.

Spotify has more than 10 million paying subscribers worldwide and another 30 million users of its free service.

Spotify provides digital rights management-restricted content from record labels including Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group and Universal. Music can be browsed or searched by artist, album, genre, playlist, or record label.

Launched in Sweden in October 2008, Spotify has gone from strength to strength and attracted major interest from potential acquirers.