PR Submits Bid to Amazon to Become New HQ2 (BLOOMBERG)

CatsMeow83 Member

19POSTS

8 years ago

Presented without comment:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles … azon-s-hq2

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lgustaf Serial expat

401POSTS

8 years ago

Won't happen.

Fred Indonesia Expert

30549POSTS

8 years ago

lgustaf wrote:
Won't happen.

Probably not but they're trying to do something that would help the locals so we have to cross our fingers for them.
With everything that place has had to put up with a bit of good news is likely to be very welcome.

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Sitka Serial expat

953POSTS

8 years ago

The leaders at Amazon are not stupid.

Fred Indonesia Expert

30549POSTS

8 years ago

Sitka wrote:
The leaders at Amazon are not stupid.

Probably true but I bet they hate tax so the right deal might just lure them in.

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lgustaf Serial expat

401POSTS

8 years ago

My money is on Atlanta.

londonpride Guest

0POSTS

8 years ago

Washington Post article this a.m. about what happened to Seattle post-Amazon invasion of 50,000.

PR a long shot but maybe Bezos has a soft heart?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business … bb5d7bc5d2

Fred Indonesia Expert

30549POSTS

8 years ago

lgustaf wrote:
My money is on Atlanta.

Not sure about that after Trump's tweet about them.
That state voted for Trump so, if the company is politically bent or just bloody minded, they may consider a democrat voting area or somewhere trump has insulted or upset in whatever way.
PR would be top of the list there. more so if they are able to offer tax incentives.

Regardless of trump either way, it'd be nice for PR to get it as it would help with a very difficult situation for the people of that island.

From a purely business point of view, the positive public relations message and massive publicity that would come from setting up in that area would be worth a fortune.

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Sitka Serial expat

953POSTS

8 years ago

#10

Is the new headquarters strictly administrative? or is it also a distribution hub? If it is part of a distribution system, the south east makes more sense.

lgustaf Serial expat

401POSTS

8 years ago

#11

Amazon is already putting in a distribution center in Atlanta, and while the new center will be primarily administrative, PR doesn't fit the criteria -- even if it offered zero tax status.

Among Amazon's criteria for the HQ is a good mass transit system, reliable communications and utilities, large supply of highly-educated/technical workforce, and excellent amenities. Raleigh, Boston and Austin are also high on the list.

And keep this in mind. Jeffrey Shumer, University of Washington: “You have to think about how many of your residents are set up to fill some of those (highly technical jobs). What’s your education infrastructure? Do you have a strong STEM program in your city? ... If not, you could get the worst of both worlds — local residents who don’t have any hope of participating in the new economy but who see their housing costs (among others) balloon as hordes of tech workers flood in."

And that's for starters.

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SimCityAT Expert

13891POSTS

8 years ago

#12

We will just have to wait and see, they will let us know next year. Anything is possible. They can pull out of other projects pretty quickly.

WarnerW Serial expat

314POSTS

8 years ago

#13

Sitka wrote:
Is the new headquarters strictly administrative? or is it also a distribution hub? If it is part of a distribution system, the south east makes more sense.

Strictly admin, a second HQ. I doubt that PR has the skilled employees necessary to staff such a large office, and I don't think it's a good idea to import the white collar workers and relegate the locals to the janitorial staff.

A distribution hub employs more low-skilled labor (I once worked at a 3M distribution center), but you are correct -- that would make even less sense in Puerto Rico.

seoulguy Contributor

143POSTS

8 years ago

#14

Whoever put forth the bid gets a good grade for effort, but none of it makes sense now without a reliable power grid (not just hammering old poles into the ground), potable water (not just the touted "running water"), that has been EPA tested seven ways to Sunday, and, as someone said above, reliable, island-wide mass transit. Skilled workers looking for relocation options are, as far as I know, looking for "green-conscious" communities. On a good day, what does PR do with all the trash? What did Maria do to the landfills. Is that debris leaching into the water supply? Probably also a good idea to show potential industrial partners that disease outbreaks can be controlled. Oh, and what about communications?

Fred Indonesia Expert

30549POSTS

8 years ago

#15

Even an epic fail on the bid can't hurt PR as it's brought them back into the news and they need people to know of their problems.

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mongohampshire Member

15POSTS

8 years ago

#16

New Hampshire's governor also submitted a bid, they have very little mass transit but also no general sales tax. It's worth a try! Amazon has a call center in Costa Rica, and certainly they train their staff well. Even if PR doesn't get the HQ2, they could end up with a call center.

CatsMeow83 Member

19POSTS

8 years ago

#17

When I first saw this I was a little bit outraged that PR had wasted precious government resources on putting this "dead-on-arrival" bid together, at a time when those resources could have been much better utilized in other areas. But I see the point raised by some of the posts above - that at least this bid raises awareness of PR and perhaps puts a bug in AMZN's ear for any smaller (much, much smaller) projects that it may consider in the very distant future.

As for HQ2, there is a 0% chance that the PR submission will receive any serious consideration. AMZN is looking for a place to park 50,000 highly-educated STEM graduates coming out of AMZN's typical hiring grounds (Harvard, MIT, Stanford, etc.). These folks aren't going to be migrating to a place where people are drinking from creeks (no matter how much AMZN pays them, or how awesome it is to work for AMZN). The island's pending bankruptcy would also seem to be a prohibitive factor for AMZN, but I don't think they'll have to get that far.

I thought this article might have been from The Onion when I first saw the headline.

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londonpride Guest

0POSTS

8 years ago

#18

It was a PR p r opportunity, probably cost about the price of a FedEx overnight letter. Multiple media outlets reporting that ahead of the deadline 238 bids were received and some cities turned to stunts to try and stand out, for example representatives from Tucson, Arizona, sent a 21-foot tall cactus.

CatsMeow83 Member

19POSTS

8 years ago

#19

I saw a copy of the PR bid - it was very extensive and comprehensive (as were most of the bids). There were some serious resources poured into putting together PR's bid. I would estimate somewhere in the hundreds of hours, at the very least. This wasn't some throw-and-go proposal that the PR authorities just slapped a stamp on.

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londonpride Guest

0POSTS

8 years ago

#20

Wow, surprised me. What were they offering?

CatsMeow83 Member

19POSTS

8 years ago

#21

I can't really get into the specifics, but they didn't offer a firm deal on anything like tax incentives, etc. It was more of a general pitch, with assurances that tax incentives of various types were on the table and subject to discussion.

londonpride Guest

0POSTS

8 years ago

#22

Really? And you say it was very extensive and comprehensive and you estimate somewhere in the hundreds of hours, at the very least, into putting it together. Interesting, thanks. But why is it so top secret?

Sitka Serial expat

953POSTS

8 years ago

#23

Is the bid on line?

londonpride Guest

0POSTS

8 years ago

#24

A lot of it is, but I guess there are some top secret things Meows can't divulge.

PR is offering Roosevelt Roads which has its own power grid independent of PREPA so somebody 50 years ago or whenever that military base was built had the foresight to see that disaster coming.

PR Economic Development and Commerce Secretary Manuel Laboy said that was the reason it was offering that property, and also offered existing tax incentives under Act 20.

I'd like to know what the really good secret stuff is that PR offered.

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CatsMeow83 Member

19POSTS

8 years ago

#25

Sitka - I don't think so. I tried to search and see if it might be out in the public domain, but it doesn't appear to have been publicly released, at least not yet.