A journey inside Epic Systems’ mythical and sprawling campus, a world away from Wall Street
A sign that reads “Epic Intergalactic Headquarters” on campus.
Epic Systems
Dorothy Gale was right — the Land of Oz is not in Kansas. Rather, it’s nestled within the rolling green fields of Verona, Wisconsin, a town of nearly 16,400 people located about 10 miles southwest of the capital city of Madison.
Verona is home to the whimsical, sprawling 1,670-acre headquarters for Epic Systems, one of the biggest privately held U.S. tech companies. Epic’s software is seemingly ubiquitous across hospitals and clinics, storing the medical records of more than 280 million people in the U.S.
While the company’s workforce is tasked with the hefty responsibility of building tools to support doctors and nurses as they provide care to patients, Epic employees spend their days milling in and out of offices that look as if they were plucked straight from the pages of a sci-fi novel or children’s book.
A yellow brick road inspired by “The Wizard of Oz” winds through the hallways of a gleaming, emerald green building. Giant chocolate chips mark the entryway to the chocolate factory, and a mischievous cat grins through the window of a building guarded by life-sized playing cards.
The Oz office building on Epic’s campus.
Courtesy: Epic Systems
Last week, thousands of health-care executives descended on Epic’s sprawling campus for the company’s annual Users Group Meeting, in part to hear about new products and upcoming initiatives. This year’s theme was “storytime,” and Judy Faulkner, the company’s 81-year-old CEO, took the stage dressed as a swan, complete with a plume of feathers in her hair.
Faulkner, a reserved mathematician who founded Epic in a basement in 1979, told the crowd that the surrounding buildings and their upkeep account for 8% of the company’s total expenses. But she made the obvious point, that it’s a lot cheaper for Epic to buy land and build in Verona than it would be in a tech hub like San Francisco, Seattle or New York. And in this small midwestern town, the company is far from big city distractions.
“Most of us in software development are active sci-fi readers,” Faulkner said during her keynote.
The Wizards Academy Campus.
Courtesy: Epic Systems
For public market investors, Epic has always been somewhat of a fantasy.
The company, with its 14,000-person workforce, doesn’t follow a preordained budget, has made zero acquisitions and never accepted any investment from venture capitalists. It abides by its own set of Ten Commandments, according to its website, the first of which is, “do not go public.”
Epic generated revenue last year of $4.9 billion. Cerner, Epic’s top rival in the electronic medical records market, went public in 1986 and was acquired by Oracle in 2022 for over $28 billion. According to Oracle’s financials, Cerner contributed $5.9 billion in revenue in fiscal 2023.
The S&P 500’s sub-index of software and services companies trades for 9 times revenue. At the average, that would give Epic a valuation of roughly $45 billion.
Faulkner doesn’t care for a Cerner-like outcome. Epic’s second commandment, after all, is “do not be acquired.”
“Why be owned by people whose interest is primarily return of equity?” Faulkner said onstage last week.
Touring Epic’s campus, it’s clear that the company exists a universe away from Wall Street.
Each of Epic’s 28 office building is themed. They’re clustered into mini-campuses, with names like Prairie Campus, Farm Campus, Central Park Campus, Wizards Academy Campus and Storybook Campus. The buildings have gotten more ornate over the years, which has necessitated some haggling with architects, according to Epic’s website.
Conference room chairs match their buildings’ intricate themes. And while the campus’ dinosaurs, suits of armor and its functioning carousel are fun to observe, they also serve a purpose. Faulkner says her plan was to build a friendly environment that could attract and inspire talent and to ensure that her employees have the quiet space they need to be productive, according to a series of testimonials on Epic’s website.
“We compete with big tech,” Faulkner said in a testimonial. “These attributes help us hire the best staff possible. That helps us be more productive.”
An aerial view of Epic’s campus.
Epic Systems
Faulkner says individual offices should be available to every worker who wants one. With the vast majority of the company’s workforce showing up daily to headquarters, some people double up, since hiring often outpaces construction.
Those who want to escape the office altogether, can hop on one of the company’s 600 cow-print bikes to take meetings from a treehouse, slide down a rabbit hole or grab lunch in a train car.
A universe underground
Epic’s address provides the first clue of its netherworld existence. The company is located at 1979 Milky Way, a nod to the date of its inception and Faulkner’s affinity for a celestial theme.
Visitors are greeted by a sign that reads “Epic Intergalactic Headquarters” as they travel down a road that winds between buildings and vast fields of green. Around 750 acres of Epic’s campus are active farmland sprinkled with 42 sheep, 14 cows and a donkey.
The majority of the company’s parking structures are underground, which helps the campus maintain an impressive feel from above. It also means employees don’t have to worry about scraping snow or ice off of their cars during the bitter midwestern winter.
Even when not parking, workers are no strangers to the underground. The campus’ buildings are connected via a network of tunnels and enclosed skyways, so people don’t have to step outside to travel between them.
The exterior of Epic’s Deep Space auditorium.
Courtesy: Epic Systems
Employees are also required to attend a monthly staff meeting in an underground auditorium called Deep Space. The meetings last for around two hours, and employees present projects and discuss industry trends.
They always include a grammar lesson, too, Faulkner told the Users Group Meeting in the auditorium, which opened in 2013 and can seat around 11,400 people. The room is a feat of engineering, as there are no pillars holding it up.
To get to Deep Space, visitors must descend through levels of the Earth. The different levels of the building are named Sky, Grass, Dirt, Rock, Magma and Core. The lobby outside the auditorium is inspired by “The Lord of the Rings” series, and the word “precious” is scrawled ominously on the wall in giant, glowing red letters.
Sci-fi references are everywhere. There’s a cafeteria called 42, which is the answer to the question of life, the universe and everything in the “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” The Wizards Academy Campus draws clear inspiration from “Harry Potter,” and has its own King’s Cross train station, giant chess set and collection of unruly portraits.
Epic is building a brand new campus, on the same grounds, that’s inspired by epic fantasies like “Game of Thrones” and “Star Wars.” The cranes were decorated with massive kites that soared high above the campus during last week’s event.
Epic’s Endor Treehouse.
Courtesy: Epic Systems
Though each office building sports its own unique theme, the skeleton of the physical structures are all very similar. Long hallways of offices are broken up by the occasional conference room, and most buildings are no more than three stories tall, a design choice that Faulkner says is intended to promote in-person meetings.
The Prairie Campus, home to the oldest offices at Epic, has buildings named after celestial bodies like stars, planets and galaxies.
On the Storybook Campus, the building called Mystery looks like an old mansion, where one could easily imagine Sherlock Holmes wandering the halls. The Castaway building resembles a ship, and its interior is full of nautical decor.
The walls in many of the buildings are decorated from floor to ceiling. Trinkets, ceramics, mosaics and paintings sourced from local artists are displayed at every turn.
A snowy day at Epic’s campus.
Epic Systems
Wandering the grounds during the Users Group Meeting, it was easy to forget that Epic is a software company.
However, on the outside of its fantasy campus, medical professionals and their patients have very real-world needs from this massive technology vendor. And there are plenty of very real critics.
Epic has for years been accused of dragging its feet around interoperability efforts that would help streamline the exchange of patient information between vendors.
Health-care data in the U.S. has historically been siloed and difficult to move around, as clinics, hospitals and health systems can store their information in a variety of formats across dozens of different vendors. The data is also protected by federal laws like the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA.
Oracle, which is now Epic’s chief rival, says Epic is fiercely protective over its turf. In a May blog post, Oracle Executive Vice President Ken Glueck wrote that “everyone in the industry understands that Epic’s CEO Judy Faulkner is the single biggest obstacle to EHR interoperability.”
Epic has of late been helping the federal government establish a data exchange network called the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement, or TEFCA, which aims to iron out both the legal and technical requirements for sharing patients’ data at scale. Epic said last month that it’s planning on moving all of its customers to TEFCA by the end of next year.
But the company still plans to use its extensive proprietary network. At its Users Group Meeting, Epic announced a number of new generative artificial intelligence features for its Cosmos platform, which is a deidentified patient dataset that clinicians can use to support treatment and conduct research.
Seth Hain, Epic’s senior vice president of research and development, spoke to reporters after the keynote in a meeting room decorated like a lodge. Hain had just presented a lofty demo to the audience where an AI agent evaluated his recovery after a supposed wrist surgery by cross-referencing data from Cosmos.
He said these sorts of tools could be ready in as soon as a few years.
“The technology is progressing very rapidly,” Hain said.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks alongside U.S. President Donald Trump to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on May 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Kevin Dietsch | Getty Images
At Tesla, vehicle sales are slumping, profits are thinning and revenue from regulatory credit sales are poised to dry up due to Republican-led policy changes.
In the past, CEO Elon Musk’s futuristic promises have convinced investors to look past top and bottom line numbers.
Not now.
Following another fairly dismal earnings report this week, Musk told analysts on the call that Tesla’s electric vehicles will soon become driverless, making money for owners while they sleep. He also said Tesla’s robotaxi service, which the company recently started testing in a limited capacity in Austin, Texas, will expand to other states, with a goal of being able to reach half the U.S. population by year-end, “assuming we have regulatory approvals.”
It didn’t matter.
Tesla shares plummeted 8% on Thursday as investors focused on the immediate challenges facing the company, including the rapid rise of lower-cost EV competitors, particularly in China, and a political backlash against Musk that harmed Tesla’s brand in the U.S. and Europe.
Automotive sales declined 16% year-over-year in the second quarter for the EV maker, with weak sales numbers continuing in Europe and California. Musk said there could be a “few rough quarters” ahead because of the EV credits expiring and President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The stock bounced back some on Friday, gaining 3.5%, but still ended the week down and has now fallen 22% this year, the worst performance among tech’s megacaps. The Nasdaq rose 1% for the week and is up more than 9% in 2025, closing at a record on Friday.
“Look, we love robotaxis. And robots,” wrote analysts at Canaccord Genuity, who recommend buying Tesla’s stock, in a note after the earnings report. “Over time, Tesla is well positioned to benefit from these future-forward opportunities.”
The analysts, however, said that they’re focused on the profit and loss statement, writing: “But we love growth too, in the here and now. We need the P&L dynamics to turn.”
Analysts at Jefferies described the earnings update as “a bit dull.” And Goldman Sachs said Tesla’s robotaxi effort is “still small” with limited technical data points.
Tesla didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Musk, who has previously called himself “pathologically optimistic,” has been able to sway shareholders and send the stock soaring at times with promises of self-driving cars, humanoid robots and more affordable EVs.
But after a decade of missed self-imposed deadlines on autonomous driving, Wall Street is watching Tesla fall behind Alphabet’s Waymo in the U.S. and Baidu’s Apollo Go in China.
In Tesla’s shareholder deck, the company said the second quarter marked the start of its “transition from leading the electric vehicle and renewable energy industries to also becoming a leader in AI, robotics and related services.” The company didn’t offer any new guidance for growth or profits for the year ahead.
Regulatory hurdles
Business Insider reported on Friday that Tesla told staff its robotaxi service could launch in the San Francisco Bay Area as soon as this weekend.
But Tesla hasn’t applied for permits that would be required to run a driverless ridehailing service in California, CNBC confirmed. The company would first need authorizations from the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles and the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC).
The CPUC told CNBC on Friday, that under existing permits, Tesla can only operate a human-driven chartered vehicle service, not carry passengers in robotaxis.
Waymo driverless vehicles wait at a traffic light in Santa Monica, California, on May 30, 2025.
Daniel Cole | Reuters
On the earnings call, Musk and other Tesla execs claimed the company was working on regulatory approvals to launch in Nevada, Arizona, Florida and other markets, in addition to San Francisco, but offered no details about what would be required.
Within Austin, the company said its robotaxi service had driven 7,000 miles, and that Tesla has been restricting its robotaxis’ to roads with a speed limit of 40 miles per hour. The Austin service involves a small fleet of about 10 to 20 Model Y vehicles equipped with the company’s latest self-driving systems.
The Tesla robotaxis rely on remote supervision by employees in a customer service center, and a human safety supervisor in the front passenger seat, ready to intervene if needed.
Compare that to what Alphabet said on its second-quarter earnings call the same day as Tesla’s results.
“The Waymo Driver has now autonomously driven over 100 million miles on public roads, and the team is testing across more than 10 cities this year, including New York and Philadelphia,” Alphabet said. Meanwhile, Waymo has become significant enough that Alphabet added a category to its Other Bets revenue description in its latest quarterly filing.
“Revenues from Other Bets are generated primarily from the sale of autonomous transportation services, healthcare-related services and internet services,” the filing said. The Other Bets segment remains relatively small, with revenue coming in at $373 million in the quarter.
Regardless of investor skepticism, Musk is more bullish than ever.
On Friday, the world’s richest person posted on his social network X that he thinks Tesla will someday be worth $20 trillion. On the earnings call earlier in the week, he said that when it comes to AI for cars and robots, “Tesla is actually much better than Google by far” and “much better than anyone at real world AI.”
CORRECTION: The Waymo Driver has now autonomously driven over 100 million miles on public roads, according to Alphabet. A previous version misstated the number of miles.
WATCH: Tough quarter for Tesla
A vehicle Tesla is using for robotaxi testing purposes on Oltorf Street in Austin, Texas, US, on Sunday, June 22, 2025.
Tim Goessman | Bloomberg | Getty Images
In an earnings call this week, Tesla CEO Elon Musk teased an expansion of his company’s fledgling robotaxi service to the San Francisco Bay Area and other U.S. markets.
But California regulators are making clear that Tesla is not authorized to carry passengers on public roads in autonomous vehicles and would require a human driver in control at all times.
“Tesla is not allowed to test or transport the public (paid or unpaid) in an AV with or without a driver,” the California Public Utilities Commission told CNBC in an email on Friday. “Tesla is allowed to transport the public (paid or unpaid) in a non-AV, which, of course, would have a driver.”
In other words, Tesla’s service in the state will have to be more taxi than robot.
Tesla has what’s known in California as a charter-party carrier permit, which allows it to run a private car service with human drivers, similar to limousine companies or sightseeing services.
The commission said it received a notification from Tesla on Thursday that the company plans to “extend operations” under its permit to “offer service to friends and family of employees and to select members of the public,” across much of the Bay Area.
But under Tesla’s permit, that service can only be with non-AVs, the CPUC said.
The California Department of Motor Vehicles told CNBC that Tesla has had a “drivered testing permit” since 2014, allowing the company to operate AVs with a safety driver present, but not to collect fees. The safety drivers must be Tesla employees, contractors or designees of the manufacturer under that permit, the DMV said.
In Austin, Texas, Tesla is currently testing out a robotaxi service, using its Model Y SUVs equipped with the company’s latest automated driving software and hardware. The limited service operates during daylight hours and in good weather, on roads with a speed limit of 40 miles per hour.
Robotaxis in Austin are remotely supervised by Tesla employees, and include a human safety supervisor in the front passenger seat. The service is now limited to invited users, who agree to the terms of Tesla’s “early access program.”
On Friday, Business Insider, citing an internal Tesla memo, reported that Tesla told staff it planned to expand its robotaxi service to the San Francisco Bay Area this weekend. Tesla didn’t respond to a request for comment on that report.
In a separate matter in California, the DMV has accused Tesla of misleading consumers about the capabilities of its driver assistance systems, previously marketed under the names Autopilot and Full Self-Driving (or FSD).
Tesla now calls its premium driver assistance features, “FSD Supervised.” In owners manuals, Tesla says Autopilot and FSD Supervised are “hands on” systems, requiring a driver at the wheel, ready to steer or brake at all times.
But in user-generated videos shared by Tesla on X, the company shows customers using FSD hands-free while engaged in other tasks. The DMV is arguing that Tesla’s license to sell vehicles in California should be suspended, with arguments ongoing through Friday at the state’s Office of Administrative Hearings in Oakland.
Under California state law, autonomous taxi services are regulated at the state level. Some city and county officials said on Friday that they were out of the loop regarding a potential Tesla service in the state.
Stephanie Moulton-Peters, a member of the Marin County Board of Supervisors, said in a phone interview that she had not heard from Tesla about its plans. She urged the company to be more transparent.
“I certainly expect they will tell us and I think it’s a good business practice to do that,” she said.
Moulton-Peters said she was undecided on robotaxis generally and wasn’t sure how Marin County, located north of San Francisco, would react to Tesla’s service.
“The news of change coming always has mixed results in the community,” she said.
Brian Colbert, another member of the Marin County Board of Supervisors, said in an interview that he’s open to the idea of Tesla’s service being a good thing but that he was disappointed in the lack of communication.
“They should have done a better job about informing the community about the launch,” he said.
Alphabet’s Waymo, which is far ahead of Tesla in the robotaxi market, obtained a number of permits from the DMV and CPUC before starting its driverless ride-hailing service in the state.
Waymo was granted a CPUC driverless deployment permit in 2023, allowing it to charge for rides in the state. The company has been seeking amendments to both its DMV and CPUC driverless deployment permits as it expands its service territory in the state.
— NBC’s David Ingram reported from San Francisco.
WATCH: Waymo testing self-driving cars with human drivers in New York and Philadelphia
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes a keynote speech during the Meta Connect annual event, at the company’s headquarters in Menlo Park, California, on Sept. 25, 2024.
Manuel Orbegozo | Reuters
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Friday said Shengjia Zhao, the co-creator of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, will serve as the chief scientist of Meta Superintelligence Labs.
Zuckerberg has been on a multibillion-dollar artificial intelligence hiring blitz in recent weeks, highlighted by a $14 billion investment in Scale AI. In June, Zuckerberg announced a new organization called Meta Superintelligence Labs that’s made up of top AI researchers and engineers.
Zhao’s name was listed among other new hires in the June memo, but Zuckerberg said Friday that Zhao co-founded the lab and “has been our lead scientist from day one.” Zhao will work directly with Zuckerberg and Alexandr Wang, the former CEO of Scale AI who is acting as Meta’s chief AI officer.
“Shengjia has already pioneered several breakthroughs including a new scaling paradigm and distinguished himself as a leader in the field,” Zuckerberg wrote in a social media post. “I’m looking forward to working closely with him to advance his scientific vision.”
In addition to co-creating ChatGPT, Zhao helped build OpenAI’s GPT-4, mini models, 4.1 and o3, and he previously led synthetic data at OpenAI, according to Zuckerberg’s June memo.
Meta Superintelligence Labs will be where employees work on foundation models such as the open-source Llama family of AI models, products and Fundamental Artificial Intelligence Research projects.
The social media company will invest “hundreds of billions of dollars” into AI compute infrastructure, Zuckerberg said earlier this month.
“The next few years are going to be very exciting!” Zuckerberg wrote Friday.
WATCH: Meta announces massive ‘Prometheus’ & ‘Hyperion’ data center plans
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