See also: Silicon

Silicon Valley indicates the pole of the advanced technology industries located at the south of the Baie of San Francisco in California, with the the United States. Even if this area is not a Vallée strictly speaking, the expression often indicates by Métonymie the industry of state-of-the-art technologies in general. The town of San Jose is more the big city of Silicon Valley. In English, the expression “  Silicon Valley  ” is generally not preceded by an article.

A moving definition

Silicon Valley being defined by its economic activity, its borders are fuzzy and in constant evolution. The expression not corresponding to an administrative entity, indicating an area including/understanding some 2 million inhabitants and 6  000 companies of high technology. Its GDP is equivalent to that of a country like the Chile.

Some make correspond Silicon Valley to the Comté of Santa Clara, which includes/understands largest of the companies of state-of-the-art technologies of the area. More generally, one considers that Silicon Valley includes the northern part of the Vallée of Santa Clara, as well as the localities of the south of the Péninsule of San Francisco and the south-east of bay. The organization Joint Venture Silicon Valley Network, which set up a socio-economic index for the area, defines it as the whole of the county of Santa Clara, plus the localities of Foster City, San Mateo, Belmont, San Carlos, Redwood City, Atherton, East Palo Alto, Woodside, Portola Valley and Menlo Park in the Comté of San Mateo, the localities of Union City, Fremont and Newark in the Comté of Alameda, and Scotts Valley in the county of Santa Cruz.

It arrives finally sometimes that the expression is used, often by the Média S nationals or international, to indicate the whole of the technological companies of the urban Région of San Francisco. Many specialized companies in the Software or the services Internet are indeed located at San Francisco, and a pole of Biotechnologie S exists in the east of the peninsula. Other companies are located in the east of bay, like Pixar with Emeryville or E-Loan with Pleasanton.

Silicon Valley is crossed in the North-South direction by the highway U.S. 101 (called simply One-O-One by the autochtones).

History

An agricultural past

The Amerindian S Ohlone were the first inhabitants of the area now indicated like Silicon Valley. When the Spanish arrive, of many missions are built and exploited with indigenous labor. The first Spanish colonists then American exploit mainly their grounds for the cereal culture and the breeding, but starting from the Années 1860, the farmers reconvert into the fruit-bearing Arboriculture, and of the Conserverie S appear. The valley of Santa Clara becomes an area of fruit-bearing Arboriculture important until the Second world war. The intensive agriculture forced the farmers of the area to dig artesian wells to irrigate their exploitation as of the end of the 19th century, causing geological depressions — in the the Sixties, the town of San Jose had been thus inserted of more than three meters. The Dryness S of the the Twenties and 30 and the demographic expansion of the Après-guerre conduirent the counties of the area and the State to build Barrage S and Aqueduc S to feed the whole of bay. The aqueduct of the south of bay conveys water thus coming from the Delta of Sacremento, that of Hetch Hetchy arrives of the Sierra Nevada, and the network of San Felipe Project sprinkles the south of bay with the water of the San Luis Tank in the Comté of Merced.

Today, of very rare commercial farms remain in the middle of Silicon Valley, even if one finds that and there traces of the old orchards which covered a good part of the county of Santa Clara. The town of Scotts Valley remains however very rural, as well as the surroundings of Gilroy.

Paradoxically, the economic prosperity of Silicon Valley contributed to that of many wine exploitations in the area, in particular in the Monts Santa Cruz and the county of Santa Cruz. Many individuals having made fortune in state-of-the-art technologies reconverted thus themselves or invested in the icole sector Vin.

The phase of opening

The name of Silicon Valley , forged in 1971 by a local journalist, Gift Hoefler, was inspired by the trust of Semi-conducteur S and of Informatique in the valley of Santa Clara, hitherto known especially for its many Verger S. Silicon is the English word for Silicium, one of basic materials of the electronics components, more precisely industries of the electronic and the Informatique.

It is there that was truly forged the image of companies started from nothing (starts-up, or Startup S ) often in a family residence (with for example, the Garage Hewlett-Packard where was launched Hewlett Packard with Palo Alto, become a museum, Symbole of the American Rêve and Historic building) to become technological and industrial giants (like Apple with Cupertino or Sun Microsystems and Intel with Santa Clara).

To obtain such a profitable combination, should have been gathered very particular assets. Even if it is difficult to determine which was the formula miracle (many are those which would like to find it to reproduce it in other places), some concordant elements contributed in a clear way:

  • access easy to water, necessary to the purification of the components containing Silicon;
  • university environment (the Université of Stanford developed an industrial park dedicated to the companies in incubation);
  • funding sources (Capital risk) easily available.

Robert Noyce (1927 - 1990), the inventor of the integrated circuits in 1958 and cofounder of the company Intel in 1968 with Gordon Moore and Andrew Grove, was called “  the mayor of Silicon Valley  ” (honorary title and history).

D-emergence

After this bad patch, the vagueness of the Web 2.0, and especially an acceleration of diversification towards other fields that data processing, in particular towards the Biotechnologies and the renewable energies, gave again a new breath with Silicon Valley. New concerns which are done day relates to the development of new scientific and technological poles in the world, with the example of Bangalore, become its large rival, where many companies of high technologies partially or completely moved their centers of calls, and, gradually, part of their activities.

The area remains the principal technological epicentre of the California, offering the highest wages and employing the most employees and of “  cerveaux  ” of the sector, according to the report/ratio California Cybercities 2006 published by AeA, an professional association of the industry of high technologies.

2006 seems to have seen a decisive turn for the pole, which found its economic health according to the annual report of the Joint Venture Silicon Valley. The organization estimates that more 30  000 jobs would have been created between July 2005 and July 2006, accompanied in particular by an investment of 900 million US dollars in technologies touching with the energies known as “  propres  ”. The Department of the economic development of the State confirmed this tendency by announcing in March 2007 an increase of 2,6% of the rate of use of the area between January 2006 and January 2007, a new growth since April 2001.

The same report/ratio notes also the crucial role played by the étrangers : the Immigration doubled there between 2005 and 2006, another language is spoken that English in 48% of the hearths of Silicon Valley, and 55% of the employees in the fields of sciences and technologies were born apart from the United States (the India and the China representing the fish ponds of the most important brains).

The standard of living in Silicon Valley and the area of the Baie of San Francisco in general remain however among highest of planet, and only 26% of the hearths have a sufficient purchasing power to become owners. The report/ratio notes also a worrying tendency in the field of education, with a decline of the number of the graduates and an increase of the youthful Délinquance.

Companies

Silicon Valley accommodates the head offices and campus of many companies, among which:

Anecdotes

  • the municipality of San Jose, more the big city of the valley of Santa Clara, proclaims off Capital Silicon Valley .

See too

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