• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, February 8, 2011

Fresh off its $500 million investment and $50 billion valuation, Facebook today announced it's moving to larger quarters in Silicon Valley. Starting in June, the company will begin shifting the 1,400 employees in its Palo Alto, Calif. headquarters to a 57-acre campus formerly occupied by Sun Microsystems in nearby Menlo Park.

The property contains nine buildings totaling about 1 million square feet. Facebook has also purchased an adjacent 22-acre tract at 312 and 314 Constitution Drive connected to the campus by a tunnel, underneath the Bayfront Expressway, for possible future development as a subsequent expansion phase. Facebook will maintain its current offices on Page Mill Road in Palo Alto through 2011, and possibly into 2012. Below, an artist's rendering of the possible building lobby.