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Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

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Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#231

Post by s73ver_ »

maxerickson wrote: post #136
ghaff wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the parent's point still probably stands. Wherever they end up, assuming there really is a 50K HQ2 in the end, they have to convince a lot of people to relocate. And a lot of people would be: 1.) Detroit, no thanks or 2.) I can live with Detroit but when I end up leaving Amazon after 2 years like so many people do, I'd have to find a job in a different location. I imagine the talent question at least factored…

My point is that the problem is largely one of perception. The hundreds of thousands of people in the area with technical educations aren't working at McDonald's.

"My point is that the problem is largely one of perception."

That very well might be true, but that's Detroit's problem to fix, not Amazon's. Amazon doesn't want to have to deal with that; they want a place that they can get people to come to day 1.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#232

Post by LargeWu »

Woofles wrote: post #186
freehunter wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it's a massive list to have said they've whittled it down much, but I can see some misses. St Louis isn't there, Detroit isn't there, Tampa and Orlando aren't there, Milwaukee isn't there, Phoenix isn't there, Houston isn't there, Minneapolis isn't there, Baltimore isn't there. They put out far too big of a list of candidates, but they have apparently ruled out just as many major metro areas.

I'm fairly certain that given Target already has a hold of Minneapolis, there's no way they'd allow Amazon to move in on their turf.

It was a major consideration from the standpoint of local and state government here. With both Target and Best Buy headquartered here, it would have ruffled a lot of feathers if Amazon would have received a bunch of handouts that homegrown companies weren't getting, especially since Amazon is completely dominating them both. There are also statutory limits on what incentives the MN state government can provide, on the order of 7 figures and maybe some limited tax breaks; I'm sure it didn't move the needle at all.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#233

Post by akhilcacharya »

nsx147 wrote: post #10

Ask for Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area to build better transportation, and that's the pick

I grew up in Raleigh and go to NC State. I'm very skeptical that RDU is a better location than Newark (NJIT, Stephens, Rutgers, Columbia, NYU) or Atlanta (GTech, UGA).

The talent is here at UNC and Duke but airport and local public transit is the weakest point.

With that said, I'd love for them to come here as long as they maintain salary parity.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#234

Post by saosebastiao »

hinkley wrote: post #221
saosebastiao wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing about Amazon is that they do a hell of a lot more than just write software.

But they need logistics centers in those areas, NOT a headquarters.

They also need product managers, vendor managers, inventory managers, analysts, planners, forecasters, operations managers, customer service agents, human resources, legal, research scientists, security, marketing, IT, financial operations, as well as the world's most overweight and useless middle management layer ever seen.

Even in Seattle, programmers make up well less than half of Amazon's personnel.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#235

Post by cpitman »

phkahler wrote: post #57
jasode wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is that Amazon isn't _seriously_ considering all 20 cities equally. Instead, they privately already have 2 or 3 particular cities in mind and the other 18 cities are just there for negotiating leverage for the 2 they really want. The problem is that the cities themselves don't know if they're "really in contention" or just "disposable chess pieces". Again, that's just my guess.

Yeah, there's funny concentration of options right by - and including - Washington D.C.

Yep, this will start yet another bidding war on our area. For the last couple years we've had a constant back and forth of each region trying to claim the new FBI headquarters.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#240

Post by patrickxb »

I think travel between HQ and HQ2 has to be a nonstop flight for it to be viable.

The cities sorted by number of nonstops to Seattle per day:

Los Angeles 23 Denver 18 Chicago 14 Dallas 12 Washington, D.C. 7 Atlanta 6 Newark 6 New York 6 Boston 5 Austin 3 Nashville 2 Philadelphia 2 Raleigh, N.C. 2 Indianapolis 1 Toronto, Canada 1 Miami 1 Columbus 0 Pittsburgh 0 Montgomery County, Md. ? Northern Virginia ?

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