Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – For years, an obscure company called ‘Flannery Associates’ has been buying up undeveloped land in the northeastern part of San Francisco in Solano County.
Hundreds of landlords received tempting offers to sell their properties above market value. As a result, many are curious about who is actually the person behind the massive land purchase.
A report from The New York Times finally uncovers this mystery. A number of technology billionaires are called joint ventures to buy land that is planned to be made into ‘heaven on earth’.
They wanted to create an exclusive city where tens of thousands of citizens would live. The city will separate the two areas, namely urban and rural areas.
“The city will be powered by environmentally friendly energy, public transportation, and adequate urban living,” said Flannery Associates in a 2017 document, quoted from Mashable, Monday (28/8/2023).
Some of the tech billionaires participating in the joint venture are LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman; venture capital investors Andreessen Horowitz, Marc Andreessen; Steve Jobs’ widow, Even Laurene Powell Jobs; to several startup and crypto figures.
According to a report by The New York Times, the brains behind Flannery Associates is a 36-year-old former Goldman Sachs trader named Jan Sramek.
All this time, Flannery Associates had been operating in silence. However, they were eventually exposed because they needed to lobby the local government.
This is because Flannery Associates is in an effort to buy agricultural land and other property that does not belong to residents. That way, like it or not they need to negotiate with the local government.
Flannery Associates promised to create jobs, new homes, and adequate public facilities, so that the local government would approve their initiative.
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