Amazon's headquarters in Seattle is perhaps one of the most imposing campuses in the United States and perfectly encapsulates that company's standing as one of the largest corporations in the world. However, Amazon is now planning to build a second Headquarter in North America and is hunting for the ideal location where it could be built. According to the company's announcement, the second headquarters will be just as grand as the one in Seattle and the cost of development could be as much as $5 billion.
Second headquarters
Amazon announced yesterday that the company is planning to build a new headquarter in North America that will be equally as big as their imposing headquarter at Seattle.
The announcement also pointed out the economic boost that it will bring to the city that is eventually chosen by Amazon and the company has requested state governments to submit their proposals for the big project. According to the company's statement, the eventual cost of the new headquarters, currently called HQ2 will run to around $5 billion over a period of around 15 years and there is no doubt that it will be an incredible job creator in the city in which it is eventually built.
Amazon's chief executive Jeff Bezos released a statement in which he pointed out the economic prospect of the new headquarter. “We expect HQ2 to be a full equal to our Seattle headquarters. Amazon HQ2 will bring billions of dollars in up-front and ongoing investments, and tens of thousands of high-paying jobs.”
Lots of interest
As one might expect, the announcement has immediately attracted a lot of interest from a host of cities.
Government officials from Chicago, St. Louis, Philadelphia, and Memphis among others have already registered their interest and hence there is no doubt that Amazon will also expect certain concessions from the city that eventually gets to be the home of its second headquarters. Interested parties have been told to register their applications through a website that has been specially created for this purpose and there is no doubt that the number of applications will rise manifold in the days to come.
The second headquarters will be home to 50,000 employees and a majority of them will be fresh hires, which is why it gives Amazon a lot of leverage when it comes to negotiating the terms with the local government. As a Bloomberg report pointed out, Boeing got concessions amounting to around $60 million after it moved its headquarters, consisting of merely 500 workers, to Seattle to Chicago. So, Amazon can expect hefty concessions.
