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I would put Philadelphia in the Top 5 at very least. Located dead center of BosWash, it somehow managed to elude the COL disadvantage that Boston, New York and Washington DC now enjoy.
No way it is Philly.Bezos wants a city with a better economy. Read the NY Times article
That article is about as logical or informed as many posts here. It makes huge assumptions despite there being a specific RFP. Sure it notes those points, but ignores glaring issues with the cities that it pickes. Amazon could pick one of the cities of course, but the article is not well done.
Exactly! People are just naming cities they believe to be the most important economic engines. Beyond the criteria listed in the RFP, I believe cost of operations/living will be a factor. I also don't believe that HQ2 will be in the Pacific or mountain time zones.
Then you would agree with the Tesla/SolarCity presence in Buffalo then, which has finally started to get the ball rolling in terms of hiring.
Yes. It is a great investment that will serve a longterm purpose.
I would have preferred it if the city had lured in major design and innovation concept offices or like a major secondary office in downtown with some high level operations in the company and positions that made it easier for capital infusion into the market, in addition to the Gigafactory 2. However, I understand that was not in the cards because Tesla and/or SolarCity want to keep their main office operations in CA.
That being said though, Gigafactory 2 is also great, even if just on its own. It's a high value investment and will have a great impact on the regions economy as the region begins manufacturing solar panels that will eventually be utilized by Musk for the newline of homes he has envisioned further down the road (see the video I posted in the previous page with regard to more information). Those homes will feature solar panel roof tiles. The panels will be able to essentially power the entire home in a cost effective manner, that comes in addition to the solar panels having enough power to recharge potential electric vehicles as well. In addition to the other ventures that Musk has in store that will require solar panels.
Musk plans to announce locations for Gigafactory 3, Gigafactory 4, Gigafactory 5, and maybe Gigafactory 6 by the end of this calendar year. Each facility will see equal or greater monetary investment to it as Amazon's HQ2, but the thing is that the Gigafactories will retrofit American manufacturing in an entirely new manner. This positions the cities that will get them to be at the forefront of manufacturing and technical engineering for the future. Especially as that sector begins to evolve. Elon Musk is the pioneer for this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rickms
That article is about as logical or informed as many posts here. It makes huge assumptions despite there being a specific RFP. Sure it notes those points, but ignores glaring issues with the cities that it pickes. Amazon could pick one of the cities of course, but the article is not well done.
Well you'd be right if I was relying on the CRE experts but I never said that I put stock into what the article stated. I only posted it to update the thread with commercial real-estate experts weighing in on their choices. In fact, my pick is Boston, a choice the CRE folks didn't even have on their shortlist. No one other than Amazon executives know where HQ2 is going.
Either way, doesn't really matter to me. If I lived in the U.S. then I'd prefer it if my city didn't go all in for HQ2 or make a bid for Amazon at all. Amazon is Walmart if Walmart's operations were based on the Internet instead of actual physical store locations. Amazon is the Walmart of this generation. What Walmart was a generation ago is what Amazon has become today. Quite literally IMO. The resemblance is uncanny, especially now that Amazon has added a grocery component to its overall operations.
Alexa, the Artificial Intelligence unit of Amazon and Amazon's crown jewel when it comes to "innovation", isn't even the best A.I. system in development or on the market. It's just a poor man's Google Home. It's not even up to par with Siri. Not to mention other A.I. systems that are even better both in development but also on the market.
If this was all about higher quality and more prestigious corporations like Bloomberg Media, Tesla, SpaceX, then I'd have a different opinion. Those would be well worth it. Well worth a city shelling out tax payer money to lure their headquarters into town. Not Amazon though.
Last edited by Trafalgar Law; 09-20-2017 at 08:38 AM..
Boston and DC/NVa are the two choices in the northeast. My money is on somewhere in TX or Atlanta
It's clear that the NYT article is pretty arbitrary. Even if you use their logic for process of elimination (which doesn't makes sense--fastest job growth is very distinctively different from "stable business climate for growth"), some of the metros they eliminate lately have had faster job growth than the cities they keep in the running (i.e., jobs in the Detroit [2.2%] and Philadelphia [1.9%] areas have grown faster than New York [1.8%] and Oklahoma City [1.7%] as of July 2017: https://www.bls.gov/web/metro/largem...able_footnotes)
It's apparent at this point that most media outlets are simply using assumptions and arbitrary analytical methods for their "top picks." No one will ever know all of Amazon's factors in its decision (certainly they're not required to divulge everything in their RFP), nor will we know how each of these factors is weighted.
Unless your name is Jeff Bezos, or are someone who works closely with him, at the end of the day, we're all just guessing.
I am not well versed on the situation in Pennsylvania to know the exact definitive details regarding what each of its 2 major cities will push with respect to Amazon.
Philadelphia offers the following attributes:
1. Located in the middle of BosWash linked by a network of highways, rail lines, airports, interstate highways with access to over 50 million people within a few hours.
2.Three shovel-ready locations linked to a public transit network of subways, commuter rail, buses, trolleys and Amtrak Acela lines.
3. An international hub airport linked by rail shuttle 20 minutes from downtown.
4. An “eds and meds” tech economy with three major urban campus universities, over 100 metro area universities and colleges, and access to recruiting to some of the nation’s most prestigious universities located along the I95 corridor.
5. One of the nation’s most walkable downtowns, appealing to an ever-growing millennial population.
6. The most affordable of the BosWash cities.
1. Located in the middle of BosWash linked by a network of highways, rail lines, airports, interstate highways with access to over 50 million people within a few hours.
2.Three shovel-ready locations linked to a public transit network of subways, commuter rail, buses, trolleys and Amtrak Acela lines.
3. An international hub airport linked by rail shuttle 20 minutes from downtown.
4. An “eds and meds” tech economy with three major urban campus universities, over 100 metro area universities and colleges, and access to recruiting to some of the nation’s most prestigious universities located along the I95 corridor.
5. One of the nation’s most walkable downtowns, appealing to an ever-growing millennial population.
6. The most affordable of the BosWash cities.
I do too. Though it’s debatable that Amazon is looking to become a bi-coastal enterprise, it just makes sense to me. Given that, Philly offers pretty much the same advantages as its BosWash siblings, but with a more affordable price tag.
4. An “eds and meds” tech economy with three major urban campus universities, over 100 metro area universities and colleges, and access to recruiting to some of the nation’s most prestigious universities located along the I95 corridor.
That’s a starter list.
One little known fact is that Pennsylvania overall is #2 only to Massachusetts in per capita degrees awarded annually in Computer Sciences and STEM (see slide 9 of this report: http://masstech.org/sites/mtc/files/...tch%20Deck.pdf)
That's a HUGE boon for a build-in skilled talent pipeline that few other states (and its major metros) can claim. To the extent that Philadelphia the most affordable BosWash alternative, it's all just sitting right there for any company to take advantage of it.
I do too. Though it’s debatable that Amazon is looking to become a bi-coastal enterprise, it just makes sense to me. Given that, Philly offers pretty much the same advantages as its BosWash siblings, but with a more affordable price tag.
I think Philly has a great shot, but are they really more affordable than Boston/DC? Aren't taxes in PA/Philly higher than places like DC?
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