Rapidly growing Apple Inc. has bought 98 acres of land in Cupertino, nearly doubling the size of its headquarters in the city in U.S. state of California, U.S. media reported on Friday.

Apple bought the land from another Silicon Valley giant Hewlett- Packard Co. (HP), which is moving out of the site to consolidate operations at its headquarters in California’s Palo Alto, the San Jose Mercury News reported, saying that an Apple spokesman has confirmed the purchase.

The new site is adjacent to a 50-acre land Apple had previously bought. Both properties are just a short drive from Apple’s main campus, which Cupertino city officials said is about 35 acres.

“We now occupy 57 buildings in Cupertino and our campus is bursting at the seams,” Apple spokesman Steve Dowling was quoted as saying.

“These offices will give us more space for our employees as we continue to grow,” he added.

According to an earlier report by the San Jose Mercury News, Apple added 12,300 employees in the past year, raising its global work force to 46,600, many of them in Cupertino.

Neither Apple nor HP revealed the purchase price, although HP reportedly had sought as much as 300 million U.S. dollars, the newspaper said.

VietNamNet/Xinhuanet