12 ms·

I (and many of my programmer friends) believe this to be correct; and moreover that city is Austin, Texas. There was basically no need for Austin to be a finali

by pm90 9y ago

I (and many of my programmer friends) believe this to be correct; and moreover that city is Austin, Texas. There was basically no need for Austin to be a finalist; I don't think the city was particularly interested in getting them (we're already booming and most folks are already grumbling about increasing property taxes and congestion etc.). They already have a pretty big presence in Austin and are expanding rapidly. I'm 99% sure this was a cheap stunt to get some kind of incentive/subsidy from the City. I'm actually very glad there is little popular support for their proposal. See http://www.statesman.com/news/breaking-news/austin-shortlist-for-amazon-second-headquarters/n1XY7VrIrzdhbihoZRtMIL/ http://www.statesman.com/news/breaking-news/austin-shortlist.... Quote: > Austin officials said in October that no local financial incentives were included in the city's proposal for the Amazon project.

ericabiz 9y ago
Agreed; Austin already has the Whole Foods HQ and a huge Apple and Facebook presence. Amazon also has a huge presence just outside Austin in San Marcos. As an Austinite, I was really proud to see the city offered no financial incentives. Seems they've learned from the Domain issues (locals will understand this reference.) I would be happy to have Austin selected as the city for HQ2. On local FB groups I have said I didn't think it would happen due to other cities offering better incentives, and I think that's why Amazon ran this contest. Instead of just saying "Austin", they said "Well, Austin...unless somewhere else gives us an unbeatable deal." :-/
- simplyluke 9y ago
  Also UT providing a pipeline of top CS talent and a healthy tech scene locally compared to a lot of the other final cities.
- txsh 9y ago
  In the early days of Whole Foods they built stores with cash and bought land to build shopping centers instead of renting. I believe HQ2 may be the real reason Amazon acquired Whole Foods, because it owned a lot of real estate in Austin.
  - cthalupa 9y ago
    Amazon favors urban locations for their offices, however. How is a bunch of spread out grocery store land going to help them build enough office space near each other to fit 50,000 employees? What are they going to do with all of the whole foods locations on that property? Sorry, but the idea that the WF acquisition was to actually end up with a bunch of spread out land that isn't usable for their purposes at a premium far above what they would pay for the land itself is just silly. If it goes to Austin and WF has spare land it might get used, but they would never have made the purchase just for that.
    - txsh 9y ago
      I think my comment went over your head. Whole Foods started in Austin and has been buying real estate for decades. They famously purchased land based on the percentage of college graduates in an area. They purchased land in urban areas. I don’t why you would assume otherwise. They purchased land and held onto unused real estate to keep their competition from building new stores. They own a lot of land in prime locations. Often they’re the landlord of all the other business near them. Ever wonder why you see natural pet food stores and eco-friendly dentists next to a Whole Foods? It’s because they own the block. Let me know if I need to explain this further.
      - astro_robot 9y ago
        > I think my comment went over your head. > Let me know if I need to explain this further. No need to be condescending. However, I think he did have a good point. I can't see Amazon buying Whole Foods to acquire their Real Estate holdings. I also don't see those holdings being valuable in terms of a HQ2 location. I would imagine the HQ building would be similar to the one in Seattle, in the fact that it is downtown and not near an area with college graduates. Also, that building would most likely be a large office building which would be out of place in a area like that.
        txsh 9y ago
        You seem to think I'm talking about residential areas. I'm talking about downtown Austin real estate. Here's photo of land Whole Foods owns or leases (mostly owns) in downtown Austin that I pieced together from information in news articles. They likely have much more. https://i.imgur.com/AxOp9Xl.png https://i.imgur.com/AxOp9Xl.png
madcaptenor 9y ago
In Atlanta, where I am, everybody pretty much thinks the same... except replace Austin with Atlanta. I suspect people in both cities are biased.
- theli0nheart 9y ago
  It's hard to argue with the fact that Austin made the shortlist without any incentives. The same doesn't apply to Atlanta.
  - Throwndjjfne 9y ago
    The short list isn't very short... Somerville made it and I'd be stunned if we were chosen.
    - theli0nheart 9y ago
      It's pretty short compared to the 238 cities that applied (https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-refuses-arizonas-cactus-as-bidders-for-hq2-climb-to-118/ https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-refuses-...).
    - xefer 9y ago
      I think Boston and Somerville are just two different manifestations of one regional proposal, though they weren't really presented that way far as I know. The sites in Somerville are actually a much better choice than the Suffolk Downs site offered by Boston. They're a lot closer to the Boston itself and are better situated for housing and transportation. It would also knit together those grim parts of Somerville that are cut off from the rest of the town by Routes 93 and 28.
    - autokad 9y ago
      agree, 20 cities is a lot. i could be wrong, but who really expects LA to make it?
  - devonkim 9y ago
    I am a bit confused about Austin as a candidate partly because I thought that Amazon wanted an east coast presence, not mid-country. So it boils really down to Boston, DC, and Atlanta as options. As another engineer in Atlanta, I’ve got mixed feelings on whether the criteria Amazon put forth is really met. There’s probably more people from Atlanta that leave for tech than stay by a long shot given I’ve probably met more Georgia Tech graduates over my career outside Atlanta than actually in the metro area. Anecdotal evidence aside, there’s been several articles published about Atlanta’s brain drain problem specific to tech (medicine does not seem to apply given CDC and Emory attract world-class doctors just fine). I’m not sure if anyone on HN outside the region can name a single tech company HQed in Atlanta off the top of their head - I certainly couldn’t before I moved here.
wedaugtwo 9y ago
I read a very convincing article on how it will most likely be near D.C. https://slate.com/business/2018/01/amazon-is-totally-putting-hq2-in-d-c-right.html https://slate.com/business/2018/01/amazon-is-totally-putting...
- amyjess 9y ago
  Yep, that analysis is pretty spot-on. Honestly, I thought it was going to be Washington—Arlington—Alexandria before they even announced the finalists, and the choice of finalists just confirmed it.
- pjdemers 9y ago
  I'll be more specific and say the DC area, either eastern Montgomery county, along the red or green line; or near the yellow line in DC or NoVa.
simplyluke 9y ago
100%. The fact that whole foods HQ is here is icing on the cake. There's land near the domain that's effectively reserved for it.
thinkloop 9y ago
Doesn't this is a sense show the system is partially working? Austin, who barely cares to get the HQ and has other attractive properties for tech companies, is offering no incentives, while underdog cities who really want the HQ but have less compelling properties are showing their willingness to try harder. Classic story. I get the race-to-the-bottom argument, but then what mechanisms can an underdog city use to ever compete?
- Retric 9y ago
  Efficiency, city's don't need to get bigger. Build a city for it's current residents and more people and companies will want to move there. Remember, if someone wants to move to a larger city they can. However, being smaller is actually appealing because you get less traffic etc. Further, city's are only important due to it's residents, if everyone moved somewhere else it's not like the land is going to get upset.
  - thinkloop 9y ago
    > city's are only important due to it's residents That's the problem, how do you spark the network effect? People don't setup in SF for ironic atari t-shirts, they're there for the talent pool and infrastructure (i.e. the stuff amazon will bring)
    - JBlue42 9y ago
      People have been talking lately about how Pittsburgh has turned things around. The Raleigh-Durham area is always talked about as kind of an unappreciated, affordable place for tech people to work. Both downtowns have improved over the past decade or two (like in many small cities), the three big universities have plenty of students, RTP is around, the only thing really against it is the suburban sprawl. I hear they are getting light rail but I've heard people talking about rail in NC since I was a child (30 some years ago).
      - notatoad 9y ago
        >the only thing really against it is the suburban sprawl as much as HN (me included) likes to complain about sprawl, don't forget that there's plenty of people who love the suburbs. Sprawl is not a downside for everybody - the people who like it just call it "affordable single-family homes" and "quiet neighbourhoods" instead of sprawl
amyjess 9y ago
Personally, I think it's one of the three locations in Washington—Arlington—Alexandria. Of all the finalists, it's the only metro area that's broken into three. Every other finalist represents an entire metro area, but Amazon lists DC, NoVa, and Montgomery County as separate finalists. The implication of this is that even if Amazon was going to pick from the finalists at random, that metro area has three times the chances of any other. On a deeper level, I think it means that they've already decided on putting HQ2 in the Washington—Arlington—Alexandria MSA, but they haven't yet decided what part of the MSA they're going to put it in, and they're going to have the three real finalists duke it out amongst themselves. It makes sense: Amazon has some pretty deep ties to the area. Their original AWS datacenters are in NoVa. Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post. Bezos also just bought a house in DC. The area is just as much home to Amazon as Seattle is. Edit: Also, as a Texan myself, there's no way anything in Texas is going to get HQ2 with our LGBT-hostile state legislature. It's the same reason people are saying that Indianapolis might as well be disqualified due to the Indiana state legislature refusing to pass a hate crimes bill. Given what our legislature tried to pull this year, Amazon isn't going to touch us. And you can bet they'll try again in 2019, and Joe Straus won't be there to stop them.
- pm90 9y ago
  > Edit: Also, as a Texan myself, there's no way anything in Texas is going to get HQ2 with our LGBT-hostile state legislature. It's the same reason people are saying that Indianapolis might as well be disqualified due to the Indiana state legislature refusing to pass a hate crimes bill. Given what our legislature tried to pull this year, Amazon isn't going to touch us. And you can bet they'll try again in 2019, and Joe Straus won't be there to stop them. They are up for election this year and even though it seems likely that the Governor won't change, other seats seem much more competitive.
- Animats 9y ago
  Bezos also just bought a house in DC. That's where it will be. The Wall Street Journal once noted that about 70% of corporate HQ moves move it closer to the CEO's place of residence.
  - 9y ago
s2g 9y ago
Even if Austin (or whoever) doesn't include them, they will still try to extort tax breaks from Washington. Boeing has been doing this for a long time.

by pm90 9y ago

ericabiz 9y ago

Agreed; Austin already has the Whole Foods HQ and a huge Apple and Facebook presence. Amazon also has a huge presence just outside Austin in San Marcos. As an Austinite, I was really proud to see the city offered no financial incentives. Seems they've learned from the Domain issues (locals will understand this reference.) I would be happy to have Austin selected as the city for HQ2. On local FB groups I have said I didn't think it would happen due to other cities offering better incentives, and I think that's why Amazon ran this contest. Instead of just saying "Austin", they said "Well, Austin...unless somewhere else gives us an unbeatable deal." :-/

simplyluke 9y ago
Also UT providing a pipeline of top CS talent and a healthy tech scene locally compared to a lot of the other final cities.
txsh 9y ago
In the early days of Whole Foods they built stores with cash and bought land to build shopping centers instead of renting. I believe HQ2 may be the real reason Amazon acquired Whole Foods, because it owned a lot of real estate in Austin.
- cthalupa 9y ago
  Amazon favors urban locations for their offices, however. How is a bunch of spread out grocery store land going to help them build enough office space near each other to fit 50,000 employees? What are they going to do with all of the whole foods locations on that property? Sorry, but the idea that the WF acquisition was to actually end up with a bunch of spread out land that isn't usable for their purposes at a premium far above what they would pay for the land itself is just silly. If it goes to Austin and WF has spare land it might get used, but they would never have made the purchase just for that.
  - txsh 9y ago
    I think my comment went over your head. Whole Foods started in Austin and has been buying real estate for decades. They famously purchased land based on the percentage of college graduates in an area. They purchased land in urban areas. I don’t why you would assume otherwise. They purchased land and held onto unused real estate to keep their competition from building new stores. They own a lot of land in prime locations. Often they’re the landlord of all the other business near them. Ever wonder why you see natural pet food stores and eco-friendly dentists next to a Whole Foods? It’s because they own the block. Let me know if I need to explain this further.
    - astro_robot 9y ago
      > I think my comment went over your head. > Let me know if I need to explain this further. No need to be condescending. However, I think he did have a good point. I can't see Amazon buying Whole Foods to acquire their Real Estate holdings. I also don't see those holdings being valuable in terms of a HQ2 location. I would imagine the HQ building would be similar to the one in Seattle, in the fact that it is downtown and not near an area with college graduates. Also, that building would most likely be a large office building which would be out of place in a area like that.
      - txsh 9y ago
        You seem to think I'm talking about residential areas. I'm talking about downtown Austin real estate. Here's photo of land Whole Foods owns or leases (mostly owns) in downtown Austin that I pieced together from information in news articles. They likely have much more. https://i.imgur.com/AxOp9Xl.png https://i.imgur.com/AxOp9Xl.png

madcaptenor 9y ago

In Atlanta, where I am, everybody pretty much thinks the same... except replace Austin with Atlanta. I suspect people in both cities are biased.

theli0nheart 9y ago
It's hard to argue with the fact that Austin made the shortlist without any incentives. The same doesn't apply to Atlanta.
- Throwndjjfne 9y ago
  The short list isn't very short... Somerville made it and I'd be stunned if we were chosen.
  - theli0nheart 9y ago
    It's pretty short compared to the 238 cities that applied (https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-refuses-arizonas-cactus-as-bidders-for-hq2-climb-to-118/ https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-refuses-...).
  - xefer 9y ago
    I think Boston and Somerville are just two different manifestations of one regional proposal, though they weren't really presented that way far as I know. The sites in Somerville are actually a much better choice than the Suffolk Downs site offered by Boston. They're a lot closer to the Boston itself and are better situated for housing and transportation. It would also knit together those grim parts of Somerville that are cut off from the rest of the town by Routes 93 and 28.
  - autokad 9y ago
    agree, 20 cities is a lot. i could be wrong, but who really expects LA to make it?
- devonkim 9y ago
  I am a bit confused about Austin as a candidate partly because I thought that Amazon wanted an east coast presence, not mid-country. So it boils really down to Boston, DC, and Atlanta as options. As another engineer in Atlanta, I’ve got mixed feelings on whether the criteria Amazon put forth is really met. There’s probably more people from Atlanta that leave for tech than stay by a long shot given I’ve probably met more Georgia Tech graduates over my career outside Atlanta than actually in the metro area. Anecdotal evidence aside, there’s been several articles published about Atlanta’s brain drain problem specific to tech (medicine does not seem to apply given CDC and Emory attract world-class doctors just fine). I’m not sure if anyone on HN outside the region can name a single tech company HQed in Atlanta off the top of their head - I certainly couldn’t before I moved here.

wedaugtwo 9y ago

I read a very convincing article on how it will most likely be near D.C. https://slate.com/business/2018/01/amazon-is-totally-putting-hq2-in-d-c-right.html https://slate.com/business/2018/01/amazon-is-totally-putting...

amyjess 9y ago
Yep, that analysis is pretty spot-on. Honestly, I thought it was going to be Washington—Arlington—Alexandria before they even announced the finalists, and the choice of finalists just confirmed it.
pjdemers 9y ago
I'll be more specific and say the DC area, either eastern Montgomery county, along the red or green line; or near the yellow line in DC or NoVa.

simplyluke 9y ago

100%. The fact that whole foods HQ is here is icing on the cake. There's land near the domain that's effectively reserved for it.

thinkloop 9y ago

Doesn't this is a sense show the system is partially working? Austin, who barely cares to get the HQ and has other attractive properties for tech companies, is offering no incentives, while underdog cities who really want the HQ but have less compelling properties are showing their willingness to try harder. Classic story. I get the race-to-the-bottom argument, but then what mechanisms can an underdog city use to ever compete?

Retric 9y ago
Efficiency, city's don't need to get bigger. Build a city for it's current residents and more people and companies will want to move there. Remember, if someone wants to move to a larger city they can. However, being smaller is actually appealing because you get less traffic etc. Further, city's are only important due to it's residents, if everyone moved somewhere else it's not like the land is going to get upset.
- thinkloop 9y ago
  > city's are only important due to it's residents That's the problem, how do you spark the network effect? People don't setup in SF for ironic atari t-shirts, they're there for the talent pool and infrastructure (i.e. the stuff amazon will bring)
  - JBlue42 9y ago
    People have been talking lately about how Pittsburgh has turned things around. The Raleigh-Durham area is always talked about as kind of an unappreciated, affordable place for tech people to work. Both downtowns have improved over the past decade or two (like in many small cities), the three big universities have plenty of students, RTP is around, the only thing really against it is the suburban sprawl. I hear they are getting light rail but I've heard people talking about rail in NC since I was a child (30 some years ago).
    - notatoad 9y ago
      >the only thing really against it is the suburban sprawl as much as HN (me included) likes to complain about sprawl, don't forget that there's plenty of people who love the suburbs. Sprawl is not a downside for everybody - the people who like it just call it "affordable single-family homes" and "quiet neighbourhoods" instead of sprawl

amyjess 9y ago

Personally, I think it's one of the three locations in Washington—Arlington—Alexandria. Of all the finalists, it's the only metro area that's broken into three. Every other finalist represents an entire metro area, but Amazon lists DC, NoVa, and Montgomery County as separate finalists. The implication of this is that even if Amazon was going to pick from the finalists at random, that metro area has three times the chances of any other. On a deeper level, I think it means that they've already decided on putting HQ2 in the Washington—Arlington—Alexandria MSA, but they haven't yet decided what part of the MSA they're going to put it in, and they're going to have the three real finalists duke it out amongst themselves. It makes sense: Amazon has some pretty deep ties to the area. Their original AWS datacenters are in NoVa. Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post. Bezos also just bought a house in DC. The area is just as much home to Amazon as Seattle is. Edit: Also, as a Texan myself, there's no way anything in Texas is going to get HQ2 with our LGBT-hostile state legislature. It's the same reason people are saying that Indianapolis might as well be disqualified due to the Indiana state legislature refusing to pass a hate crimes bill. Given what our legislature tried to pull this year, Amazon isn't going to touch us. And you can bet they'll try again in 2019, and Joe Straus won't be there to stop them.

pm90 9y ago
> Edit: Also, as a Texan myself, there's no way anything in Texas is going to get HQ2 with our LGBT-hostile state legislature. It's the same reason people are saying that Indianapolis might as well be disqualified due to the Indiana state legislature refusing to pass a hate crimes bill. Given what our legislature tried to pull this year, Amazon isn't going to touch us. And you can bet they'll try again in 2019, and Joe Straus won't be there to stop them. They are up for election this year and even though it seems likely that the Governor won't change, other seats seem much more competitive.
Animats 9y ago
Bezos also just bought a house in DC. That's where it will be. The Wall Street Journal once noted that about 70% of corporate HQ moves move it closer to the CEO's place of residence.
- 9y ago

s2g 9y ago

Even if Austin (or whoever) doesn't include them, they will still try to extort tax breaks from Washington. Boeing has been doing this for a long time.