Space: Google's Final Frontier

Google (GOOG Quote) is ready to team up with NASA on a big space project.

No, not outer space. Though its ambitions for cataloguing all of the world's information are well established, Google so far hasn't offered up any plans to rule the rest of the universe.

Instead, the company is planning to build a million-square-foot corporate campus on a vacant site at the NASA Ames Research Center in California to accommodate its growing workforce, according to press reports.

The complex will include offices, housing and roads, according to an Associated Press dispatch that cited the San Francisco Chronicle. Ames is near Google's headquarters in Mountain View, Calif.

Google, which has a staff of some 4,200, hired 10 workers during each business day of the last quarter, the AP said. The company's decision to expand comes as it battles with deep-pocketed rivals like Yahoo! (YHOO Quote) and Microsoft (MSFT Quote) for control of the Internet.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt and G. Scott Hubbard, the head of the Ames, are scheduled to hold a 7 p.m. EDT press conference to discuss a major announcement, according to a statement on the Ames Web site. The statement didn't elaborate. Google and NASA couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

On Wednesday, Google shares fell $5.63 to $308.31.