18 ms·

Oracle Moving HQ to Austin

361 points by whatok 6y ago

rossdavidh 6y ago
Disclosure: I live in Austin, and long ago lived in South Bay area of SV. In general, I am skeptical that the pandemic will cause permanent changes, except insofar as it speeds up things that were happening anyway. But, in regards to an exodus from the very-highest-priced places to live, towards places where things are merely expensive, I wonder if this is going to be a lasting change. I had been seeing "SV/NYC is so expensive it's crazy, businesses will all leave if something doesn't get done" for so many years, I had more of less stopped waiting for it to actually occur. But this year, I wonder...
whatok 6y ago
Relevant text: Oracle is implementing a more flexible employee work location policy and has changed its Corporate Headquarters from Redwood City, California to Austin, Texas. We believe these moves best position Oracle for growth and provide our personnel with more flexibility about where and how they work. Depending on their role, this means that many of our employees can choose their office location as well as continue to work from home part time or all of the time. In addition, we will continue to support major hubs for Oracle around the world, including those in the United States such as Redwood City, Austin, Santa Monica, Seattle, Denver, Orlando and Burlington, among others, and we expect to add other locations over time. By implementing a more modern approach to work, we expect to further improve our employees’ quality of life and quality of output.
- dmode 6y ago
  What does this mean ? What does a HQ mean when people are permanent WFH ?
  - aaomidi 6y ago
    It means less taxes and less strict labor laws.
    - dmode 6y ago
      How does labor law impact anything when everyone is WFH ? Also, do taxes really have anything to do with your HQ location ? All corporations are registered in Delaware.
      - TimTheTinker 6y ago
        AFAIK, WFH employees have CA tax obligations when the company HQ is in CA, even if they’re working from other states. So all non-CA employees have less of a tax burden as a result of the HQ relocation.
        dmode 6y ago
        I don't think this is true. Employees pay taxes based on residency requirement. So if you are not a resident of CA, you don't pay taxes, regardless of where your HQ is
        baskire 6y ago
        If California can claim the work was done in or for California. They’ll tax it. If you work remote from Texas but hr says your desk is in California. You owe California taxes.
        throwawaygulf 6y ago
        This is categorically false. If you're a Texas resident, working for a California based company, but doing your work remotely in Texas, you absolutely do not owe taxes in California. The concept of "work done for California" does not exist. If the work is done in Texas (at your house), you pay Texas taxes (no income tax).
        rmk 6y ago
        There is some nuance to this. CA deliberately defines anybody who is in CA "other than for a transitory purpose" as a CA resident (for tax purposes). So if you happen to reside in TX but come to Redwood City for a couple weeks and work there, for example, CA can come after you. I am fairly certain this will happen more often once increasing numbers of people vote with their feet.
- hbcondo714 6y ago
  Name anchor link to this text: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1341439/000156459020056896/orcl-10q_20201130.htm#ITEM_5_OTHER_INFORMATION https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1341439/000156459020... Interesting this sentence is at the end of this 40+ page document under the section "Other Information". The very first page says 2300 Oracle Way Austin, Texas but their previous quarterly reports shows 500 Oracle Parkway Redwood City, California
  - muzz 6y ago
    That seems represent the actual event that occurred, ie a changing of HQ address. Yet many are assuming that employees will be moving from CA to TX, despite no indication of that.
- gallego2007 6y ago
  I read this as the US Central time zone is convenient for working with people on both Coasts and those working remote.
- muzz 6y ago
  Funny that the don't mention Bangalore, where they have more people than HQ
ilaksh 6y ago
Is _this_ the point where everyone and their grandpa has finally figured out that Austin is cool, and therefore it is automatically not cool anymore? What's the next hip town?
- adamnemecek 6y ago
  I’ve been also hearing a lot about Miami.
  - CinchWrench 6y ago
    NY -> Miami California -> Austin I think you could probably chalk a lot of this up to where company leadership has their vacation homes.
    - adamnemecek 6y ago
      No one has vacation homes in Austin.
      - jnwatson 6y ago
        My sister is building a vacation home there.
      - hotsauceror 6y ago
        The house we bought was a vacation home for a little old couple from Omaha. A remote place on a hill overlooking Lake Travis, 30 minutes from downtown. Amazing sunsets, the weather is in the 60s and 70s in January, the springtime wildflowers are unreal, there's great food, good live music, lots of charming little hill country towns just a short trip away.
      - jere 6y ago
        It doesn't make sense from a weather perspective, since Austin has brutally hot summers and cold winters.
      - CinchWrench 6y ago
rainyMammoth 6y ago
How long before all the Californians make Austin the exact same place they fled from?
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  Consider this as load balancing. It is freeing up space in the bay area.
  - muzz 6y ago
    Oracle's leaving will free up office space for Snowflake to expand into. They're taking business, might as well take offices too.
- war1025 6y ago
  "They ideas are good, they just happen to be implemented wrong every time. But this time is different"
- nodesocket 6y ago
  Joe Rogan was talking just about this[1], how he doesn't want to disrupt the culture and environment and hopes all the people fleeing California don't try to impose the same values and politics that caused them to flee California in the first place. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajyvVaeFS4&ab_channel=JREClips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajyvVaeFS4&ab_channel=JRECl...
- birdyrooster 6y ago
  Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Austin are: June. 92° / 72° July. 96° / 74° August 96° / 74° Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Cupertino are: June. 75° / 55° July. 76° / 58° August 76° / 58° Austin will never, ever be like Silicon Valley because of this. The freedom you get from cooler weather is great from an energy utilization stand point and for allowing safer and more desirable conditions outdoors. Not to mention you have much more beautiful choices of nature in Northern California. Think about whenever you travel to Austin for conferences, it's oppressively hot and you basically travel from one air conditioned building to the next. Now imagine 10 years time of increased global warming. California will still be coastal to one of the coldest waters in the world at this latitude, which is a natural air conditioner. To me this spells the end of Oracle's supremacy in anything other than selling smaller and smaller volumes of mainframes.
syntaxing 6y ago
I'm super curious how this will WFH Covid-era will play out for the Bay Area. I think the question I haven't figured out is job mobility. Pre-covid, even if you lost your job here as an engineer, finding another company thats interesting with the right pay isn't too hard which is one of the best appeals of SV. I wonder how this will play out in terms of this dynamic.
- throwaway201103 6y ago
  Should be even better? Now instead of finding another SV job you can find a job anywhere in the world.
- monadic3 6y ago
  Well presumably you'd have af least the same opportunities as before, they just won't require that you move to the bay.
- flatline 6y ago
  I'm curious what it will do to tech salaries as well. Will developers working remotely for SV companies from LCOL areas be compensated the same as those in SV? Will smaller firms elsewhere have to raise salaries to compete with locals taking non-regional salaries?
  - throwaway201103 6y ago
    You're looking at it from the wrong side. Developer supply for SV companies just expanded to include potentially everyone who for various reasons did not want to or was unable to relocate to SV. Tech salaries will fall for SV companies, though it might initially be a bump up from what those non-local developers could get in their local areas.
  - 908B64B197 6y ago
    > Will developers working remotely for SV companies from LCOL areas be compensated the same as those in SV? Some will, some won't! Truth is, those who decide to offer compensation based on value added instead of a magic HR approved formula will get interest from everyone else. I expect some companies to use this CoL-based compensation as a way to let go underperformers and others to attract talent that was previously unavailable. > Will smaller firms elsewhere have to raise salaries to compete with locals taking non-regional salaries? They'll have to.
g42gregory 6y ago
I think this is a major news for Silicon Valley. Schwab, HPE, now Oracle. I hope that this would give somebody in California Legislature a pause.
- baggy_trough 6y ago
  Considering that one of the most prominent legislators literally told Elon Musk to get fucked on Twitter, I doubt anyone is listening.
  - Rebelgecko 6y ago
    Assemblywoman Gonzalez is somewhat notorious for being a blowhard on Twitter
  - adventured 6y ago
    Fortunately the Bay Area already has a billboard for their future from which they can borrow: https://i.imgur.com/OTFSSFF.png https://i.imgur.com/OTFSSFF.png https://www.historylink.org/File/1287 https://www.historylink.org/File/1287 Tech business will be persistently pulled out of the Bay Area and into other states, Europe is about to see a large tech boom (courtesy of US venture capital) that will considerably harm the dominance that Silicon Valley has enjoyed the past several decades, combined with China continuing to make inroads in most aspects of tech. It's all pointing south for Silicon Valley, it's going to be a very ugly decade there.
    - n13 6y ago
      I agree. I'm not really sure about how much Europe will benefit but I can see other US cities becoming new tech hot spots in few years, not even in a decade. BTW, I tried writing to you via email mentioned in your profile.
  - atomi 6y ago
    California is absolutely prime real estate especially for the rich. And if you're a billionaire you're going to have to pay for the privilege. We'd sooner install our own state digital currency before allowing dollar billionaires to bully us.
1helloworld1 6y ago
Shouldn't the republican party be worried? If the trend continues and a lot of companies move from California to Texas bringing along a lot of liberal employees with them, won't that tip the already narrowing margin towards the democratic party?
- hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
  Maybe, but it's also a bit like Cubans in Florida, who tend to be quite conservative - they left Cuba because they didn't like the political situation there, similar to why a lot of Californians who move to TX are coming here.
  - hintymad 6y ago
    I doubt it. It looks the people in IT who leave California for Texas are fiscally conservative but socially liberal, who traditionally vote democrats anyway. Personally I don't see what's wrong with liberalism. What is wrong in the US is that the left prefer narratives over facts and data, and think that censorship would never one day hurt themselves.
- stickyricky 6y ago
  (This is all conjecture) Whether or not Texas "purpled" because of Trump or population dynamics is an open question in my mind. I think a person's political identity is mostly environmental rather than principled. Yes there are some beliefs which are ingrained in us but mostly those beliefs don't enter into the political arena much. Californians moving to Texas make it blue-er and themselves red-er. Who knows how this effects the electoral calculus into the future.
  - devmunchies 6y ago
    >Californians moving to Texas make it blue-er and themselves red-er. Not if people are just sitting in their home all day. They won't be influenced by their environment but will still vote the same. Dockerized voters.
  - 6y ago
orliesaurus 6y ago
I live in Austin, Oracle has a huge campus here that looks as big as an airport building with terminals/gates and all the trimmings. It's a beautiful building that gentrified the whole area, for better or worse. I ate there a couple of times, it's nice inside too! I love biking/walking around the Oracle campus area because they made a bike path and the area is safer than it was before. That being said, I know a couple of people who work there and they don't like their job - it's thankless - but I think that's the same with all big companies where you're just another number. When the pandemic hit everyone started working from home and this mega-building was pretty much empty. I am not surprised they're gonna move their HQ here. That's because they got plenty of office space to fill amongst other reasons. Also with favorable taxes and lots of space to expand (if they ever need to) as they hire more and more people. Good thing for those who purchased homes near the campus! Their value will keep increasing as more "execs" move here after the pandemic settles.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  > That being said, I know a couple of people who work there and they don't like their job I’m not surprised. I haven’t met anyone who deals with Oracle because they want to, only because they have to.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - cleansingfire 6y ago
    After an aggressive post sales upsell call: "You must buy more licenses" I laughed at them, dropped them, and they went on my "I Don't Work With Bastards" list. Of course one doesn't always have a choice, but with that list in mind, I often end up with more choice than expected. See also: last man on earth, ten foot pole.
    - ineedasername 6y ago
      I dealt with them on a large project once, ended in a lawsuit. Because 1) Their sales demos (which we recorded) pitched functionality that literally did not exist or was EOL'ed from the system without a replacement before we implemented. 2) It was a fixed-price contract, and when they screwed up & couldn't deliver on their benchmarks, they refused to continue working without additional payment 3) Paid customizations were developed in bad faith & without the contracted specs. In one example, there was a simple requirement: Users could enter a long blob of text, and clerks could review it as part of the user's record in Peoplesoft. They delivered the first part, not the second. When we asked where that functionality was, they said they didn't need to build anything more because the data was available to clerks via the assistance of a DBA. The implementation failed, we got a settlement, and chose a different vendor while out Legacy system limped along for a few more years.
danishdev 6y ago
Why is it so hard to realize that people want low taxes and light regulation? And that woke culture with it's free speech curtailment are a kind of 1984 environment where someone is watching your words constantly. California and NYC were great great states, and after decades of democrat governments, companies decide to move thousands of kilometers so they can leave these states in favor of Republican states. There's so many of individual decisions along these lines. YEt, I am not aware of anyone leaving a red state to live under the woke shackles.
- person_of_color 6y ago
  Still waiting for the great FAANG from Texas.
  - danishdev 6y ago
    Texas isn't precisely poor. Sure, 20 years ago California was a magnet for startups, but that is apparently vanishing as the democrat curtain closes in. Also, I reply to the poster above, since "I am posting too fast" @jeffbee It's not how it works. In the last 30 years people have tended to clusters of population. Specially the most skilled and immigrants. The clusters of population in US are California, New York, Houston and Chicago, 3 of which are democrat. Thats how it started. Now 3 of these clusters will start decreasing, and one will grow. Guess which. The same story of urbanization happened in China, Japan, Europe, Russia, etc..
  - grillvogel 6y ago
    Whataburger
  - abawany 6y ago
    Indeed.com is not FAANG scale but appears to be a big player in the jobseeker market.
- cromwellian 6y ago
  Well your political fantasy happens to be wrong. California experiences a net influx of highly skilled workers draining them from the rest of the US (https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/2019/4/losing-our-minds-brain-drain-across-the-united-states https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/2019...) and red states mostly lose their brightest people or absorb California residents from older failing industries who can’t afford the rents. The majority of this is about cost of living not taxes. Corporate taxes and income taxes have not really changed in recent years and California overall ranks in the middle of US states by EFFECTIVE tax rate (not the top marginal which few people pay but conservatives love to cite) Go read that study by the government on internal US migration. These “shackles” you’re talking about took me from someone who used to live in a ghetto to someone in the top 1%. The taxes are a small price to pay. Obsessing over marginal income tax rates is the wrong variable to optimize in life. Do what you love, where you love, because it’s your passion, not because you can shave 3% off of your effective tax. Most entrepreneurs don’t obsess over taxes, they’re focused on growth and solving problems, profit comes later. The constant hyper focus on marginal tax rates is a form of bean counter myopia. It’s what you do when your company is effectively in maintenance mode and beholden to the bean counters on Wall Street, not when your trying to win your market space. Wake me when Apple decides To move its HQ to a red state.
deleted 6y ago
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beagle3 6y ago
Likely irrelevant, but reminded me of this[0]: """Basically, we’re moving because of William Whyte‘s rule: virtually all corporate relocations involve a move to a location which is closer to the CEO’s home than the old location. Whyte discovered this principle after an extensive study of Fortune 500 companies that left New York City for the suburbs in the 1950s and 1960s""" Tesla will likely move its HQ to Texas following Musk's move (if it hasn't already), which would seem to be in line with Whyte's rule. However, it is likely both would have the same underlying reason (legal, financial, taxation or otherwise), rather than just "making it more conventient for musk". I wonder if Elison or Katz have also moved to Austin recently ...... [0] https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2003/03/28/finding-an-office-in-new-york-city/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2003/03/28/finding-an-office-...
- adventured 6y ago
  It's particularly interesting given Ellison and Musk have become close in recent years, with Ellison buying a large chunk of Tesla and joining the board (now a $9.5 billion personal holding). Zero chance these moves weren't widely discussed between them over time.
  - skinnymuch 6y ago
    That sounds like a big personal holding. But if he bought it in Early and mid 2019, then he probably spent under a billion for his stake. Which for him isn’t much. 1.5% of the company is still a solid portion. Especially if Musk ever needs to sell shares for some reason and needs an ally with substantial ownership to align with him for continued control
- zaphirplane 6y ago
  Interesting, somehow I don’t think how companies where run in the 1950-1960 translates to today Look at the google ML firing/resigning storm, in the 50s someone fired end of story not the CEO saying they will investigate (honesty transparency aside)
  - economusty 6y ago
birdyrooster 6y ago
Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Austin are: June. 92° / 72° July. 96° / 74° August 96° / 74° Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Cupertino are: June. 75° / 55° July. 76° / 58° August 76° / 58° Austin will never, ever be like Silicon Valley because of this. The freedom you get from cooler weather is great from an energy utilization stand point and for allowing safer and more desirable conditions outdoors. Not to mention you have much more beautiful choices of nature in Northern California. Think about whenever you travel to Austin for conferences, it's oppressively hot and you basically travel from one air conditioned building to the next. Now imagine 10 years time of increased global warming. California will still be coastal to one of the coldest waters in the world at this latitude, which is a natural air conditioner. To me this spells the end of Oracle's supremacy in anything other than selling smaller and smaller volumes of mainframes. They've started focusing further and further on cost reduction. Edit: For those downvoting me, Texas is a wasteland of has-been tech companies that couldn't cut it when in competition with the west coast and the rest of the world. Oracle isn't going to change that.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
efleeus 6y ago
Setting up their future as a patent troll as well.
- thunkshift1 6y ago
  Underrated comment
dmode 6y ago
Texas seems intent on grabbing all the deadwood valley companies. What's next ? I predict Cisco. Meanwhile, SF just had two IPOs worth $200bn
- philsnow 6y ago
  Those companies were founded 7 and 13 years ago. Wait a bit.
- pram 6y ago
  Cisco is already here fwiw
vzaliva 6y ago
Some people lament the decline of Silicon Vally companies like Tesla and Oracle moving out. I argue it could be a good thing. These giant enterprises are not really a pinnacle of entrepreneurship and innovation anymore. Let them move elsewhere and keep the Bay Area nurturing new entrepreneurs and startups. It is huge cubicle farms vs. garages and coworking places kind of distinction.
- bihla 6y ago
  Tesla and Oracle have no similarity in this regard.
  - vzaliva 6y ago
    HP?
    - muzz 6y ago
      When companies cannot innovate, cost-cutting becomes important
      - kilbuz 6y ago
        Exactly. No one was starting companies in the Bay Area because of how inexpensive it was.
- muzz 6y ago
  Tesla didn't move. Elon Musk moved, the company didn't.
  - babesh 6y ago
    True. The concern is that new development will no longer be in California.
    - muzz 6y ago
      Job openings are still aplenty for Palo Alto based location, so what would these new + all the existing employees in HQ do?
vmception 6y ago
If your town or city wants to be the next silicon valley Petition your state to change laws nullifying non-compete clauses
neildahlke 6y ago
I wonder when HN gets to the stage that all the negativity is directed towards Austin instead of San Francisco, and when we see all the posts about how tech is ruining Austin.
- pm90 6y ago
  If you live in Austin, you will already see a lot of anti tech sentiment. That said... the locals dislike everyone who isn't local, and the city attracts people in many different areas and not just Tech. Austin is huge and there is no shortage of land and no pesky regulations (or at least less of them) that it can continue to support the influx for quite a while now. I don't expect it to be the next SV until we see a few Austin-incubated startups really make it big and hopefully kickstart its own substantial startup ecosystem.
guyzero 6y ago
eh, I'm not sure this really spells the end of anything - Bay Area growth has been extremely high for years, decades even. And yes, California has a huge problem with building homes & infrastructure, but even so, it's been growing at around 8.5% for a while. At the same time people have been leaving all along and it's inevitable that changes like this will happen. I honestly think that Oracle doesn't even benefit from being in the SF area anymore anyway, they sell maintenance contracts to fortune 500 companies, you can do that from anywhere. And no one is being forced to relocate, so anyone with school-age kids or an employed spouse is likely to stay anyway.
DataSceince123 6y ago
Its ridiculous how these companies took advantage of california, paid nearly no taxes, then left to texas leaving california in massive debt !
outside1234 6y ago
At Microsoft they are starting to track your business travel days in other states and are going to WITHHOLD STATE TAXES (!!!) for the days that you spend in those states. Wonder if all of this is related.
- RyJones 6y ago
  That’s been the law forever; most people fail to file those taxes.
xyst 6y ago
Just ship every aspect of your business from CA, NY, WA to TX. Zero income taxes to the state plus the city (Austin) will even give you millions of dollars in the form of tax breaks assuming you have an "in" with the city council. Plus you consider where the world is going in terms of reversing global warming (ie, not very well), LA, SF, NYC will be under water due to the rise in sea level. Planning long term stays in these low lying areas is simply not smart, unless you don't plan to stay in business past 2050.
microtherion 6y ago
I wonder whether that could lead to a measurable decline in 101 commute time if some of their office space remains empty. Subjectively it always felt to me like some of the most congested stretches of 101 were next to Oracle building clusters, but that may be selection bias talking.
- toephu2 6y ago
  From what I hear, Austin traffic is worse than the Bay Area. Can anyone from Austin confirm?
  - krapp 6y ago
    I've never been to the Bay Area but I can confirm Austin traffic can be a nightmare.
  - yao420 6y ago
    I35 and mopac certainly seem worse than my experience with all types of Bay Area morning commutes while working as a consultant. That being said it is common advice to avoid 35 at all costs. It is always terrible as it only has 3 lanes through the core urban area. As for urban driving, I think SF is easier because of its grid system but I usually take a Lyft so can’t really say.
christophilus 6y ago
Devastating news. My thoughts and prayers go out to Austin.
worker767424 6y ago
Not sure where Larry's going to moor his yacht in Austin.
- base698 6y ago
  He can take his helicopters to the coast.
  - worker767424 6y ago
    A helicopter is just an upside down lawnmower.
  - baskire 6y ago
    More like jet.
    - base698 6y ago
      You need your helicopter to get to your jet.
del_operator 6y ago
If the Bay Area is Silicon Valley what is the hub nickname for Austin? I’m not aware of one.
- hangonhn 6y ago
  Isn't it Silicon Hills ?
deleted 6y ago
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imbnwa 6y ago
One thing that comes to mind in all this relocation commotion is that California isn't just a bureaucratic hassle but its actual physical environment is becoming a health hazard
- hedora 6y ago
  Totally valid point about California fires, but Texas is arguably worse off. Travis county’s economy will probably be OK, but they’ll soon regularly have “high wet bulb temperature” days where going outside will kill you. Also, their agricultural yields are projected to drop 67%, so any vegetation in the parks, etc will probably die off. https://projects.propublica.org/climate-migration/ https://projects.propublica.org/climate-migration/ (Type “travis county, tx” in the search bar toward the middle to see the projections.)
nova22033 6y ago
Congrats to all the lawyers in Austin...the job market is going to be great
strangattractor 6y ago
When companies cease to grow because they no longer innovate their only option is to find other ways to increase profits. This usually means mining the low hanging fruit of reduced taxation. I doubt Larry will be moving to Texas.
deleted 6y ago
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wolverine876 6y ago
As I pointed out regarding Musk's move, it's the companies with the strongest links with reactionary politics (and Trump): Thiel/Palantir, Musk, Ellison/Oracle. Does HPE somehow fit that mold? For the sake of their many stakeholders, I hope the CEOs are not overreacting to the reactionary idea bubble - that they are not taking too seriously what is political rhetoric - or acting for political purposes. Many people do not share their political views. It also matches the corporate outrage / take-my-ball-and-go strategy: If someone dares to regulate or tax a company - the outrage! - they say they are leaving. Think of Amazon in France and other places (IIRC Philadelphia passed a law requiring businesses to take cash and Amazon threatened to leave, then backed down). Think of Uber and Lyft in California. It's childish and I think if someone called them on it, it would be revealed for what it is. It's not clear to me how it's good for society that they don't have to contribute and pay their share. Finally, where will these companies recruit from? The University of Texas is pretty good, but not close to the level of Berkley and Stanford, two of the top ~6 schools in the world. Also, many more people want to live in the Bay Area than Austin in general, and IT professionals want to be in SV where the center of their industry is. Austin is nice but simply is not real competition.
ta988 6y ago
Interesting to see companies starting to move to TX. And the state being one of the leaders on renewable energy growth for a few years now. Is it the new eldorado for companies? Dystopic thought but what if the companies push the TX secession efforts to get their own land.
zeckalpha 6y ago
Shorter commute to https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_for_the_Eastern_District_of_Texas#Patent_litigation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court... > The filing of such cases in the Eastern District of Texas dropped after the 2017 Supreme Court decision in TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC, which held that for the purpose of venue in patent infringement suits, a domestic corporation "resides" only in its state of incorporation. Meanwhile, the filing of such cases in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware increased.
throwaway4good 6y ago
I assume - together with TikTok - from this article in september: https://www.texastribune.org/2020/09/22/tiktok-texas-trump/ https://www.texastribune.org/2020/09/22/tiktok-texas-trump/ President Donald Trump said Saturday that he tentatively approved a deal between the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok and Oracle and Walmart that could bring the new joint venture’s headquarters to Texas. The deal, though, still faces much uncertainty. “All of the technology will be maintained here,” Trump said at a North Carolina rally. “They’re going to move probably to the great state of Texas.” ... If approved, the new entity, TikTok Global, would contribute $5 billion to an educational fund based in Texas, according to the Austin American-Statesman, though Walmart said in a press release the money would go to the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Trump had previously requested that there be a contribution to the U.S. government in exchange for helping to arrange the deal. Walmart did not respond to a request for comment.
gigatexal 6y ago
Good. Let the exodus continue.
martyvis 6y ago
Interesting that Oracle's move got a lot more attention here on HN than HPE's announcment it is moving it's HQ to Houston a few weeks ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25271263 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25271263

361 points by whatok 6y ago

Disclosure: I live in Austin, and long ago lived in South Bay area of SV. In general, I am skeptical that the pandemic will cause permanent changes, except insofar as it speeds up things that were happening anyway. But, in regards to an exodus from the very-highest-priced places to live, towards places where things are merely expensive, I wonder if this is going to be a lasting change. I had been seeing "SV/NYC is so expensive it's crazy, businesses will all leave if something doesn't get done" for so many years, I had more of less stopped waiting for it to actually occur. But this year, I wonder...

whatok 6y ago

Relevant text: Oracle is implementing a more flexible employee work location policy and has changed its Corporate Headquarters from Redwood City, California to Austin, Texas. We believe these moves best position Oracle for growth and provide our personnel with more flexibility about where and how they work. Depending on their role, this means that many of our employees can choose their office location as well as continue to work from home part time or all of the time. In addition, we will continue to support major hubs for Oracle around the world, including those in the United States such as Redwood City, Austin, Santa Monica, Seattle, Denver, Orlando and Burlington, among others, and we expect to add other locations over time. By implementing a more modern approach to work, we expect to further improve our employees’ quality of life and quality of output.

dmode 6y ago
What does this mean ? What does a HQ mean when people are permanent WFH ?
- aaomidi 6y ago
  It means less taxes and less strict labor laws.
  - dmode 6y ago
    How does labor law impact anything when everyone is WFH ? Also, do taxes really have anything to do with your HQ location ? All corporations are registered in Delaware.
    - TimTheTinker 6y ago
      AFAIK, WFH employees have CA tax obligations when the company HQ is in CA, even if they’re working from other states. So all non-CA employees have less of a tax burden as a result of the HQ relocation.
      - dmode 6y ago
        I don't think this is true. Employees pay taxes based on residency requirement. So if you are not a resident of CA, you don't pay taxes, regardless of where your HQ is
        baskire 6y ago
        If California can claim the work was done in or for California. They’ll tax it. If you work remote from Texas but hr says your desk is in California. You owe California taxes.
        throwawaygulf 6y ago
        This is categorically false. If you're a Texas resident, working for a California based company, but doing your work remotely in Texas, you absolutely do not owe taxes in California. The concept of "work done for California" does not exist. If the work is done in Texas (at your house), you pay Texas taxes (no income tax).
        rmk 6y ago
        There is some nuance to this. CA deliberately defines anybody who is in CA "other than for a transitory purpose" as a CA resident (for tax purposes). So if you happen to reside in TX but come to Redwood City for a couple weeks and work there, for example, CA can come after you. I am fairly certain this will happen more often once increasing numbers of people vote with their feet.
hbcondo714 6y ago
Name anchor link to this text: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1341439/000156459020056896/orcl-10q_20201130.htm#ITEM_5_OTHER_INFORMATION https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1341439/000156459020... Interesting this sentence is at the end of this 40+ page document under the section "Other Information". The very first page says 2300 Oracle Way Austin, Texas but their previous quarterly reports shows 500 Oracle Parkway Redwood City, California
- muzz 6y ago
  That seems represent the actual event that occurred, ie a changing of HQ address. Yet many are assuming that employees will be moving from CA to TX, despite no indication of that.
gallego2007 6y ago
I read this as the US Central time zone is convenient for working with people on both Coasts and those working remote.
muzz 6y ago
Funny that the don't mention Bangalore, where they have more people than HQ

ilaksh 6y ago

Is _this_ the point where everyone and their grandpa has finally figured out that Austin is cool, and therefore it is automatically not cool anymore? What's the next hip town?

adamnemecek 6y ago
I’ve been also hearing a lot about Miami.
- CinchWrench 6y ago
  NY -> Miami California -> Austin I think you could probably chalk a lot of this up to where company leadership has their vacation homes.
  - adamnemecek 6y ago
    No one has vacation homes in Austin.
    - jnwatson 6y ago
      My sister is building a vacation home there.
    - hotsauceror 6y ago
      The house we bought was a vacation home for a little old couple from Omaha. A remote place on a hill overlooking Lake Travis, 30 minutes from downtown. Amazing sunsets, the weather is in the 60s and 70s in January, the springtime wildflowers are unreal, there's great food, good live music, lots of charming little hill country towns just a short trip away.
    - jere 6y ago
      It doesn't make sense from a weather perspective, since Austin has brutally hot summers and cold winters.
    - CinchWrench 6y ago

rainyMammoth 6y ago

How long before all the Californians make Austin the exact same place they fled from?

systemvoltage 6y ago
Consider this as load balancing. It is freeing up space in the bay area.
- muzz 6y ago
  Oracle's leaving will free up office space for Snowflake to expand into. They're taking business, might as well take offices too.
war1025 6y ago
"They ideas are good, they just happen to be implemented wrong every time. But this time is different"
nodesocket 6y ago
Joe Rogan was talking just about this[1], how he doesn't want to disrupt the culture and environment and hopes all the people fleeing California don't try to impose the same values and politics that caused them to flee California in the first place. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajyvVaeFS4&ab_channel=JREClips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajyvVaeFS4&ab_channel=JRECl...
birdyrooster 6y ago
Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Austin are: June. 92° / 72° July. 96° / 74° August 96° / 74° Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Cupertino are: June. 75° / 55° July. 76° / 58° August 76° / 58° Austin will never, ever be like Silicon Valley because of this. The freedom you get from cooler weather is great from an energy utilization stand point and for allowing safer and more desirable conditions outdoors. Not to mention you have much more beautiful choices of nature in Northern California. Think about whenever you travel to Austin for conferences, it's oppressively hot and you basically travel from one air conditioned building to the next. Now imagine 10 years time of increased global warming. California will still be coastal to one of the coldest waters in the world at this latitude, which is a natural air conditioner. To me this spells the end of Oracle's supremacy in anything other than selling smaller and smaller volumes of mainframes.

syntaxing 6y ago

I'm super curious how this will WFH Covid-era will play out for the Bay Area. I think the question I haven't figured out is job mobility. Pre-covid, even if you lost your job here as an engineer, finding another company thats interesting with the right pay isn't too hard which is one of the best appeals of SV. I wonder how this will play out in terms of this dynamic.

throwaway201103 6y ago
Should be even better? Now instead of finding another SV job you can find a job anywhere in the world.
monadic3 6y ago
Well presumably you'd have af least the same opportunities as before, they just won't require that you move to the bay.
flatline 6y ago
I'm curious what it will do to tech salaries as well. Will developers working remotely for SV companies from LCOL areas be compensated the same as those in SV? Will smaller firms elsewhere have to raise salaries to compete with locals taking non-regional salaries?
- throwaway201103 6y ago
  You're looking at it from the wrong side. Developer supply for SV companies just expanded to include potentially everyone who for various reasons did not want to or was unable to relocate to SV. Tech salaries will fall for SV companies, though it might initially be a bump up from what those non-local developers could get in their local areas.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  > Will developers working remotely for SV companies from LCOL areas be compensated the same as those in SV? Some will, some won't! Truth is, those who decide to offer compensation based on value added instead of a magic HR approved formula will get interest from everyone else. I expect some companies to use this CoL-based compensation as a way to let go underperformers and others to attract talent that was previously unavailable. > Will smaller firms elsewhere have to raise salaries to compete with locals taking non-regional salaries? They'll have to.

g42gregory 6y ago

I think this is a major news for Silicon Valley. Schwab, HPE, now Oracle. I hope that this would give somebody in California Legislature a pause.

baggy_trough 6y ago
Considering that one of the most prominent legislators literally told Elon Musk to get fucked on Twitter, I doubt anyone is listening.
- Rebelgecko 6y ago
  Assemblywoman Gonzalez is somewhat notorious for being a blowhard on Twitter
- adventured 6y ago
  Fortunately the Bay Area already has a billboard for their future from which they can borrow: https://i.imgur.com/OTFSSFF.png https://i.imgur.com/OTFSSFF.png https://www.historylink.org/File/1287 https://www.historylink.org/File/1287 Tech business will be persistently pulled out of the Bay Area and into other states, Europe is about to see a large tech boom (courtesy of US venture capital) that will considerably harm the dominance that Silicon Valley has enjoyed the past several decades, combined with China continuing to make inroads in most aspects of tech. It's all pointing south for Silicon Valley, it's going to be a very ugly decade there.
  - n13 6y ago
    I agree. I'm not really sure about how much Europe will benefit but I can see other US cities becoming new tech hot spots in few years, not even in a decade. BTW, I tried writing to you via email mentioned in your profile.
- atomi 6y ago
  California is absolutely prime real estate especially for the rich. And if you're a billionaire you're going to have to pay for the privilege. We'd sooner install our own state digital currency before allowing dollar billionaires to bully us.

1helloworld1 6y ago

Shouldn't the republican party be worried? If the trend continues and a lot of companies move from California to Texas bringing along a lot of liberal employees with them, won't that tip the already narrowing margin towards the democratic party?

hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
Maybe, but it's also a bit like Cubans in Florida, who tend to be quite conservative - they left Cuba because they didn't like the political situation there, similar to why a lot of Californians who move to TX are coming here.
- hintymad 6y ago
  I doubt it. It looks the people in IT who leave California for Texas are fiscally conservative but socially liberal, who traditionally vote democrats anyway. Personally I don't see what's wrong with liberalism. What is wrong in the US is that the left prefer narratives over facts and data, and think that censorship would never one day hurt themselves.
stickyricky 6y ago
(This is all conjecture) Whether or not Texas "purpled" because of Trump or population dynamics is an open question in my mind. I think a person's political identity is mostly environmental rather than principled. Yes there are some beliefs which are ingrained in us but mostly those beliefs don't enter into the political arena much. Californians moving to Texas make it blue-er and themselves red-er. Who knows how this effects the electoral calculus into the future.
- devmunchies 6y ago
  >Californians moving to Texas make it blue-er and themselves red-er. Not if people are just sitting in their home all day. They won't be influenced by their environment but will still vote the same. Dockerized voters.
- 6y ago

orliesaurus 6y ago

I live in Austin, Oracle has a huge campus here that looks as big as an airport building with terminals/gates and all the trimmings. It's a beautiful building that gentrified the whole area, for better or worse. I ate there a couple of times, it's nice inside too! I love biking/walking around the Oracle campus area because they made a bike path and the area is safer than it was before. That being said, I know a couple of people who work there and they don't like their job - it's thankless - but I think that's the same with all big companies where you're just another number. When the pandemic hit everyone started working from home and this mega-building was pretty much empty. I am not surprised they're gonna move their HQ here. That's because they got plenty of office space to fill amongst other reasons. Also with favorable taxes and lots of space to expand (if they ever need to) as they hire more and more people. Good thing for those who purchased homes near the campus! Their value will keep increasing as more "execs" move here after the pandemic settles.

lotsofpulp 6y ago
> That being said, I know a couple of people who work there and they don't like their job I’m not surprised. I haven’t met anyone who deals with Oracle because they want to, only because they have to.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- cleansingfire 6y ago
  After an aggressive post sales upsell call: "You must buy more licenses" I laughed at them, dropped them, and they went on my "I Don't Work With Bastards" list. Of course one doesn't always have a choice, but with that list in mind, I often end up with more choice than expected. See also: last man on earth, ten foot pole.
  - ineedasername 6y ago
    I dealt with them on a large project once, ended in a lawsuit. Because 1) Their sales demos (which we recorded) pitched functionality that literally did not exist or was EOL'ed from the system without a replacement before we implemented. 2) It was a fixed-price contract, and when they screwed up & couldn't deliver on their benchmarks, they refused to continue working without additional payment 3) Paid customizations were developed in bad faith & without the contracted specs. In one example, there was a simple requirement: Users could enter a long blob of text, and clerks could review it as part of the user's record in Peoplesoft. They delivered the first part, not the second. When we asked where that functionality was, they said they didn't need to build anything more because the data was available to clerks via the assistance of a DBA. The implementation failed, we got a settlement, and chose a different vendor while out Legacy system limped along for a few more years.

danishdev 6y ago

Why is it so hard to realize that people want low taxes and light regulation? And that woke culture with it's free speech curtailment are a kind of 1984 environment where someone is watching your words constantly. California and NYC were great great states, and after decades of democrat governments, companies decide to move thousands of kilometers so they can leave these states in favor of Republican states. There's so many of individual decisions along these lines. YEt, I am not aware of anyone leaving a red state to live under the woke shackles.

person_of_color 6y ago
Still waiting for the great FAANG from Texas.
- danishdev 6y ago
  Texas isn't precisely poor. Sure, 20 years ago California was a magnet for startups, but that is apparently vanishing as the democrat curtain closes in. Also, I reply to the poster above, since "I am posting too fast" @jeffbee It's not how it works. In the last 30 years people have tended to clusters of population. Specially the most skilled and immigrants. The clusters of population in US are California, New York, Houston and Chicago, 3 of which are democrat. Thats how it started. Now 3 of these clusters will start decreasing, and one will grow. Guess which. The same story of urbanization happened in China, Japan, Europe, Russia, etc..
- grillvogel 6y ago
  Whataburger
- abawany 6y ago
  Indeed.com is not FAANG scale but appears to be a big player in the jobseeker market.
cromwellian 6y ago
Well your political fantasy happens to be wrong. California experiences a net influx of highly skilled workers draining them from the rest of the US (https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/2019/4/losing-our-minds-brain-drain-across-the-united-states https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/2019...) and red states mostly lose their brightest people or absorb California residents from older failing industries who can’t afford the rents. The majority of this is about cost of living not taxes. Corporate taxes and income taxes have not really changed in recent years and California overall ranks in the middle of US states by EFFECTIVE tax rate (not the top marginal which few people pay but conservatives love to cite) Go read that study by the government on internal US migration. These “shackles” you’re talking about took me from someone who used to live in a ghetto to someone in the top 1%. The taxes are a small price to pay. Obsessing over marginal income tax rates is the wrong variable to optimize in life. Do what you love, where you love, because it’s your passion, not because you can shave 3% off of your effective tax. Most entrepreneurs don’t obsess over taxes, they’re focused on growth and solving problems, profit comes later. The constant hyper focus on marginal tax rates is a form of bean counter myopia. It’s what you do when your company is effectively in maintenance mode and beholden to the bean counters on Wall Street, not when your trying to win your market space. Wake me when Apple decides To move its HQ to a red state.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

beagle3 6y ago

Likely irrelevant, but reminded me of this[0]: """Basically, we’re moving because of William Whyte‘s rule: virtually all corporate relocations involve a move to a location which is closer to the CEO’s home than the old location. Whyte discovered this principle after an extensive study of Fortune 500 companies that left New York City for the suburbs in the 1950s and 1960s""" Tesla will likely move its HQ to Texas following Musk's move (if it hasn't already), which would seem to be in line with Whyte's rule. However, it is likely both would have the same underlying reason (legal, financial, taxation or otherwise), rather than just "making it more conventient for musk". I wonder if Elison or Katz have also moved to Austin recently ...... [0] https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2003/03/28/finding-an-office-in-new-york-city/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2003/03/28/finding-an-office-...

adventured 6y ago
It's particularly interesting given Ellison and Musk have become close in recent years, with Ellison buying a large chunk of Tesla and joining the board (now a $9.5 billion personal holding). Zero chance these moves weren't widely discussed between them over time.
- skinnymuch 6y ago
  That sounds like a big personal holding. But if he bought it in Early and mid 2019, then he probably spent under a billion for his stake. Which for him isn’t much. 1.5% of the company is still a solid portion. Especially if Musk ever needs to sell shares for some reason and needs an ally with substantial ownership to align with him for continued control
zaphirplane 6y ago
Interesting, somehow I don’t think how companies where run in the 1950-1960 translates to today Look at the google ML firing/resigning storm, in the 50s someone fired end of story not the CEO saying they will investigate (honesty transparency aside)
- economusty 6y ago

birdyrooster 6y ago

Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Austin are: June. 92° / 72° July. 96° / 74° August 96° / 74° Average high/low temperatures in the summer for Cupertino are: June. 75° / 55° July. 76° / 58° August 76° / 58° Austin will never, ever be like Silicon Valley because of this. The freedom you get from cooler weather is great from an energy utilization stand point and for allowing safer and more desirable conditions outdoors. Not to mention you have much more beautiful choices of nature in Northern California. Think about whenever you travel to Austin for conferences, it's oppressively hot and you basically travel from one air conditioned building to the next. Now imagine 10 years time of increased global warming. California will still be coastal to one of the coldest waters in the world at this latitude, which is a natural air conditioner. To me this spells the end of Oracle's supremacy in anything other than selling smaller and smaller volumes of mainframes. They've started focusing further and further on cost reduction. Edit: For those downvoting me, Texas is a wasteland of has-been tech companies that couldn't cut it when in competition with the west coast and the rest of the world. Oracle isn't going to change that.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

efleeus 6y ago

Setting up their future as a patent troll as well.

thunkshift1 6y ago
Underrated comment

dmode 6y ago

Texas seems intent on grabbing all the deadwood valley companies. What's next ? I predict Cisco. Meanwhile, SF just had two IPOs worth $200bn

philsnow 6y ago
Those companies were founded 7 and 13 years ago. Wait a bit.
pram 6y ago
Cisco is already here fwiw

vzaliva 6y ago

Some people lament the decline of Silicon Vally companies like Tesla and Oracle moving out. I argue it could be a good thing. These giant enterprises are not really a pinnacle of entrepreneurship and innovation anymore. Let them move elsewhere and keep the Bay Area nurturing new entrepreneurs and startups. It is huge cubicle farms vs. garages and coworking places kind of distinction.

bihla 6y ago
Tesla and Oracle have no similarity in this regard.
- vzaliva 6y ago
  HP?
  - muzz 6y ago
    When companies cannot innovate, cost-cutting becomes important
    - kilbuz 6y ago
      Exactly. No one was starting companies in the Bay Area because of how inexpensive it was.
muzz 6y ago
Tesla didn't move. Elon Musk moved, the company didn't.
- babesh 6y ago
  True. The concern is that new development will no longer be in California.
  - muzz 6y ago
    Job openings are still aplenty for Palo Alto based location, so what would these new + all the existing employees in HQ do?

vmception 6y ago

If your town or city wants to be the next silicon valley Petition your state to change laws nullifying non-compete clauses

neildahlke 6y ago

I wonder when HN gets to the stage that all the negativity is directed towards Austin instead of San Francisco, and when we see all the posts about how tech is ruining Austin.

pm90 6y ago
If you live in Austin, you will already see a lot of anti tech sentiment. That said... the locals dislike everyone who isn't local, and the city attracts people in many different areas and not just Tech. Austin is huge and there is no shortage of land and no pesky regulations (or at least less of them) that it can continue to support the influx for quite a while now. I don't expect it to be the next SV until we see a few Austin-incubated startups really make it big and hopefully kickstart its own substantial startup ecosystem.

guyzero 6y ago

eh, I'm not sure this really spells the end of anything - Bay Area growth has been extremely high for years, decades even. And yes, California has a huge problem with building homes & infrastructure, but even so, it's been growing at around 8.5% for a while. At the same time people have been leaving all along and it's inevitable that changes like this will happen. I honestly think that Oracle doesn't even benefit from being in the SF area anymore anyway, they sell maintenance contracts to fortune 500 companies, you can do that from anywhere. And no one is being forced to relocate, so anyone with school-age kids or an employed spouse is likely to stay anyway.

DataSceince123 6y ago

Its ridiculous how these companies took advantage of california, paid nearly no taxes, then left to texas leaving california in massive debt !

outside1234 6y ago

At Microsoft they are starting to track your business travel days in other states and are going to WITHHOLD STATE TAXES (!!!) for the days that you spend in those states. Wonder if all of this is related.

RyJones 6y ago
That’s been the law forever; most people fail to file those taxes.

xyst 6y ago

Just ship every aspect of your business from CA, NY, WA to TX. Zero income taxes to the state plus the city (Austin) will even give you millions of dollars in the form of tax breaks assuming you have an "in" with the city council. Plus you consider where the world is going in terms of reversing global warming (ie, not very well), LA, SF, NYC will be under water due to the rise in sea level. Planning long term stays in these low lying areas is simply not smart, unless you don't plan to stay in business past 2050.

microtherion 6y ago

I wonder whether that could lead to a measurable decline in 101 commute time if some of their office space remains empty. Subjectively it always felt to me like some of the most congested stretches of 101 were next to Oracle building clusters, but that may be selection bias talking.

toephu2 6y ago
From what I hear, Austin traffic is worse than the Bay Area. Can anyone from Austin confirm?
- krapp 6y ago
  I've never been to the Bay Area but I can confirm Austin traffic can be a nightmare.
- yao420 6y ago
  I35 and mopac certainly seem worse than my experience with all types of Bay Area morning commutes while working as a consultant. That being said it is common advice to avoid 35 at all costs. It is always terrible as it only has 3 lanes through the core urban area. As for urban driving, I think SF is easier because of its grid system but I usually take a Lyft so can’t really say.

christophilus 6y ago

Devastating news. My thoughts and prayers go out to Austin.

worker767424 6y ago

Not sure where Larry's going to moor his yacht in Austin.

base698 6y ago
He can take his helicopters to the coast.
- worker767424 6y ago
  A helicopter is just an upside down lawnmower.
- baskire 6y ago
  More like jet.
  - base698 6y ago
    You need your helicopter to get to your jet.

del_operator 6y ago

If the Bay Area is Silicon Valley what is the hub nickname for Austin? I’m not aware of one.

hangonhn 6y ago
Isn't it Silicon Hills ?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

imbnwa 6y ago

One thing that comes to mind in all this relocation commotion is that California isn't just a bureaucratic hassle but its actual physical environment is becoming a health hazard

hedora 6y ago
Totally valid point about California fires, but Texas is arguably worse off. Travis county’s economy will probably be OK, but they’ll soon regularly have “high wet bulb temperature” days where going outside will kill you. Also, their agricultural yields are projected to drop 67%, so any vegetation in the parks, etc will probably die off. https://projects.propublica.org/climate-migration/ https://projects.propublica.org/climate-migration/ (Type “travis county, tx” in the search bar toward the middle to see the projections.)

nova22033 6y ago

Congrats to all the lawyers in Austin...the job market is going to be great

strangattractor 6y ago

When companies cease to grow because they no longer innovate their only option is to find other ways to increase profits. This usually means mining the low hanging fruit of reduced taxation. I doubt Larry will be moving to Texas.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

wolverine876 6y ago

As I pointed out regarding Musk's move, it's the companies with the strongest links with reactionary politics (and Trump): Thiel/Palantir, Musk, Ellison/Oracle. Does HPE somehow fit that mold? For the sake of their many stakeholders, I hope the CEOs are not overreacting to the reactionary idea bubble - that they are not taking too seriously what is political rhetoric - or acting for political purposes. Many people do not share their political views. It also matches the corporate outrage / take-my-ball-and-go strategy: If someone dares to regulate or tax a company - the outrage! - they say they are leaving. Think of Amazon in France and other places (IIRC Philadelphia passed a law requiring businesses to take cash and Amazon threatened to leave, then backed down). Think of Uber and Lyft in California. It's childish and I think if someone called them on it, it would be revealed for what it is. It's not clear to me how it's good for society that they don't have to contribute and pay their share. Finally, where will these companies recruit from? The University of Texas is pretty good, but not close to the level of Berkley and Stanford, two of the top ~6 schools in the world. Also, many more people want to live in the Bay Area than Austin in general, and IT professionals want to be in SV where the center of their industry is. Austin is nice but simply is not real competition.

ta988 6y ago

Interesting to see companies starting to move to TX. And the state being one of the leaders on renewable energy growth for a few years now. Is it the new eldorado for companies? Dystopic thought but what if the companies push the TX secession efforts to get their own land.

zeckalpha 6y ago

Shorter commute to https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_for_the_Eastern_District_of_Texas#Patent_litigation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court... > The filing of such cases in the Eastern District of Texas dropped after the 2017 Supreme Court decision in TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC, which held that for the purpose of venue in patent infringement suits, a domestic corporation "resides" only in its state of incorporation. Meanwhile, the filing of such cases in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware increased.

throwaway4good 6y ago

I assume - together with TikTok - from this article in september: https://www.texastribune.org/2020/09/22/tiktok-texas-trump/ https://www.texastribune.org/2020/09/22/tiktok-texas-trump/ President Donald Trump said Saturday that he tentatively approved a deal between the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok and Oracle and Walmart that could bring the new joint venture’s headquarters to Texas. The deal, though, still faces much uncertainty. “All of the technology will be maintained here,” Trump said at a North Carolina rally. “They’re going to move probably to the great state of Texas.” ... If approved, the new entity, TikTok Global, would contribute $5 billion to an educational fund based in Texas, according to the Austin American-Statesman, though Walmart said in a press release the money would go to the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Trump had previously requested that there be a contribution to the U.S. government in exchange for helping to arrange the deal. Walmart did not respond to a request for comment.

gigatexal 6y ago

Good. Let the exodus continue.

martyvis 6y ago

Interesting that Oracle's move got a lot more attention here on HN than HPE's announcment it is moving it's HQ to Houston a few weeks ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25271263 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25271263