Pittsburgh Included In Apple's Massive Job Expansion
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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Apple's announcement that its massive expansion will include Pittsburgh is being welcomed by local leaders.
Pittsburgh has made Apple's list of cities around the country being targeted for new jobs and opportunities. The company announced plans for expansion in Pittsburgh, New York and Boulder, Colo.
Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald believes it's one of the benefits of Pittsburgh making the short list for Amazon's HQ2.
"With Pittsburgh going through the whole Amazon thing, which obviously was very, very public, but there's an ecosystem here around technology, around these information companies like Google, that's already been here. Oracle, SAP, Amazon's already here in a big way. Apple has a presence here but they announced that they're going to expand that presence," Fitzgerald said.
Pittsburgh is in line for at least 300 jobs.
"They haven't announced exactly what that'll be, but we expect that'll be a lot of [research and development]. I mean, they tap into the tech talent that's coming out of Pitt and CMU around information technology," Fitzgerald said.
Based on the growth of other high-tech companies with locations in Pittsburgh, Fitzgerald thinks there's a good chance for even more Apple jobs.
"Google continues to grow. What Uber's doing with their autonomous vehicles in Pittsburgh. What Oracle's doing, what SAP is doing, they all add more people, and really it comes down to if they're able to find the talent and attract the talent to Pittsburgh," Fitzgerald said.
Fitzgerald says Pittsburgh has a lot to offer -- such as commercial property and affordable housing -- and when you combine that with a good quality of life, he says these copanies should have no problem attracting talent here to Pittsburgh.