Mesa’s Apple data center, currently located at Signal Butte and Elliot, has exciting plans to begin assembling servers. In order to facilitate economic growth, the city of Mesa has applied for foreign trade zone status, which will allow Apple to manufacture new data servers. Apple plans on investing more than $2 billion dollars in the facility, and may bring more than 150 jobs to Mesa.
Apple has chosen Mesa Data Center to function as a global command center, storing massive amounts of iCloud and iTunes data. This command center will also manufacture high-tech data center cabinets, which are essentially storage devices that will be used at other data centers. This is a historical moment for Arizona, as it is incredibly rare for tech companies to manufacture and assemble products domestically.
“The servers Apple uses in facilities such as its data centers in Oregon and North Carolina are currently built and tested on-site, according to a person with knowledge of Apple’s data operations. Apple is now moving to consolidate that work in Mesa, where it plans to build and configure its servers before shipping them to other American data centers, the person said.” (businessinsider.com)