Technology giant Google announced Thursday it plans to open in Rochester the company's first office in Minnesota, a development that company officials said will bolster an ongoing partnership with the Mayo Clinic.
Located at Collider Coworking in the Conley-Maass-Downs building in downtown Rochester, the space is scheduled to open later this year.
Google and Mayo announced a partnership in 2019 on cloud computing, machine learning and artificial intelligence that's part of a broader trend for large technology companies eyeing a bigger role in health care.
The new office will employ a "solid handful" of people, said Chris Mueller, site lead for the Rochester office and a software engineer with Google Cloud, in an interview. He didn't offer figures for initial or future staffing.
"It represents a significant milestone as the partnership matures between Google and the Mayo Clinic," said Joe Miles, managing director for health care and life sciences industries at Google Cloud, during a Thursday news conference. "It also provides our first physical office space in the state of Minnesota."
Gov. Tim Walz added that Google's decision shows that Minnesota is "an innovative state with a talented workforce and a commitment to that ecosystem that continues to grow."
Mayo Clinic is Minnesota's largest employer. Google is the most prominent part of California-based Alphabet, where executives in recent years have shown a growing interest in developing health care businesses.
Over the past 18 months, Google and Mayo have worked together to launch Mayo Clinic Platform, a tool for developing new approaches to health care by applying artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to de-identified clinic data that's been moved onto Google's cloud computing service. The platform is a strategic priority for Mayo Chief Executive Gianrico Farrugia, who has used examples like Uber and Airbnb to explain the potential.