The multinational tech company and e-commerce giant Amazon has built the largest campus building in the world is the latest landmark in Hyderabad. The building has over 2.5 times more steel than the Eiffel Tower, a built-up area spanning about 65 football fields, a helipad, and 49 elevators which move one floor per second.
Spread over 9.5 acres, this 282-feet tall building can house more than 15,000 employees. The massive campus is built amid the gleaming towers of various corporate giants. With the Financial District, a key IT cluster, this campus with 1.8 million square feet office space is Amazon’s first owned office building outside the US and its a single largest building globally, it is also Amazon’s single largest building in the world in terms of area.
“The campus contains over 2.5 times more steel than the Eiffel Tower, measured by weight,” revealed Amazon Vice President and Global Real Estate and Facilities Director John Schoettler at the inauguration of the facility recently.
Amazon officials say the total built-up area, when spread out, will span over 68 acres or approximately 65 football fields. Out of total built-up space, 1.2 million square feet is earmarked for recreation and parking.
Interfaith prayer rooms, a mother’s room, quiet rooms, showers, helipad and an all-day open cafeteria are some of the key features of the campus, built in a short span of three years. The company officials say the structure is designed to facilitate inclusion and diversity. It also features casual, collaborative workspaces, as well as private areas for concentration and confidentiality.
“Every detail is aimed at improving well-being and efficiency, from Destination Control Systems to manage elevators that can move 972 people simultaneously, to 290 conference rooms and 3 scrum areas per floor to foster collaboration,” the company said.
Spending 18 million man-hours with over 2,000 persons were on site every day for 39 months to construct the building. Last year, the construction was awarded the Golden Trophy and Certificate from National Safety Council for the safe construction process.
The building meets stringent safety standards, with 110 km of fire protection system conduits. The campus has one conference room seat for every 3.25 workstations, higher than the global ration of 1:5.
With sustainability at its core, the campus has more than 300 trees dotting its grounds with three specimen trees aged over 200 years. It also has an 850,000-litre water recycling plant.
The company officials declined to divulge the investment made in this campus but said hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to create the facility. Stating that the facility reaffirms their long-term commitment to India, they pointed out that Amazon already announced $5 billion investment in the country and another 500 million dollars in food retail.
Amazon already houses its largest India fulfilment centre in Hyderabad. Spread over four lakh square feet, the centre is located near Rajiv Gandhi International Airport. The company last month announced that it will be expanded to 5.8 lakh square feet.