Google Is Taking Over the Former Headquarters Of Palm Computing

According to the Silicon Valley Business Journal, the search giant has leased the two-building, 285,000-square-foot complex that used to serve as the headquarters of Palm Computing, the now defunct manufacturers of the PalmPilot.

It's an interesting example of a common theme in Silicon Valley, as a rapidly growing company taking over the offices of a once-powerful firm. Palm controlled 80% of the market share for handheld computers in September 1999, but it was bought by HP in 2010 and shut down in 2011.

The space is in Sunnyvale, California, a couple of miles away from Google's headquarters in Mountain View. Google also leases 949,000 square feet in the city's Technology Corners complex, bringing the company's total to more than 1 million square feet in Sunnyvale alone.

Google has been on a tear lately - it's expected to close soon on a 400,000-square-foot office park in Mountain View, in addition to the 8-acre blimp hangar still in negotiation at Moffett Federal Airfield.

Tech analyst Rob Enderle explained Google's real estate frenzy to the Silicon Valley Business Journal: "They're in everything from longevity research to self-driving cars. They've got wearables growing. Their drone business could take off. Robotics could be bigger than PCs and smartphones combined and squared. A lot of these things they're going into are high growth, and if they take off, Google is expanding ahead of that."