Amazon alights on New York and Northern Virginia for joint ‘HQ2’
New York City and Northern Virginia are to share the spoils of a second Amazon headquarters in the US after a year-long cross-country bidding war to lure the online retailer.
Amazon alights on New York and Northern Virginia for joint ‘HQ2’
According to Reuters the split decision will see the new head office, imaginatively dubbed ‘HQ2’, straddle two cities with an even divide of responsibilities between the pair while capitalizing on the cache of being located at the heart of the nation’s economic and political capitals.
This follows reports in the New York Times which suggested that Amazon was finalizing the logistics for a migration to Long Island City in New York and Arlington, Virginia, near Washington DC.
Both out of town locations offer Amazon the advantages of lower rents and congestion than its current base in Seattle, where 45,000 people are employed, contributed to an affordable housing crisis in the city.
Upon launching the competition last year Amazon pledged to invest $5bn and recruit 50,000 workers to run its second base, drawing 238 proposals nationwide as cities and states fell over themselves to offer the largest tax breaks and other financial inducements to secure the prize.
Internationally Amazon has doubled the size of its London research and development studio, bringing its UK workforce to 24,000.
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