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Posted Sep 7, 2017, 8:41 PM
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Registered User
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Join Date: Jul 2014
Posts: 770
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Quote:
Originally Posted by iheartphilly
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Here you go:
Quote:
Economic development officials from across the Philadelphia region started to mobilize their resources and took initial steps to come up with a unified plan to make a case for Amazon to consider locating a proposed second headquarters here.
In its request for proposals, the Seattle-based company was clear in what it is seeking for what it has dubbed “Amazon HQ2.”
It wants: a metropolitan area close to an international airport, with access to major highways; a site with direct access to mass transit; enough ground to build between 500,000 square feet to 1 million square in a first phase and up to a total of 8 million square feet in a third and final phase by 2027. At build out, it could be as much as a $4 billion investment.
In exchange, Amazon said it would eventually create upwards of 50,000 jobs that pay on average more than $100,000 a year and produce billions of dollars of other economic spin off.
There is a caveat. Amazon prefers regional responses to its RFP rather than individual states.
“That’s very hard to do,” said Jay Biggins, managing director of BLS & Co., a Princeton-based firm that conducts these types of searches for corporations. “It’s complicated enough for a state to mobilize counties and municipalities much less cross state boundaries.”
By taking a regional approach, Amazon is seeking a cooperative situation if there are some infrastructure requirements that may need multi-jurisdictional solutions, such as expanding mass transit. A region also provides an “employment shed” that crisscrosses multiple areas, Biggins said.
Where a regional response can get complicated is when it comes to ponying up financial incentives, but Biggins doesn’t think Amazon will be making a decision based on incentives but rather on locations.
Amazon also wants a shovel-ready site that has any local approvals and infrastructure in place. Locally, obvious sites are the Philadelphia Navy Yard, Schuylkill Yards in University City, Camden, N.J., downtown Wilmington, Del., as well as some properties in Northern Delaware. Each of the Philadelphia region’s counties also have sites that could accommodate a campus on this scale.
Aside from Philadelphia, the Northeast, in general, will be considered because of several large metropolitan areas with dense population, access to labor, mass transit and some of the other requirements Amazon is seeking. For example, in Northern New Jersey, Journal Square could be a viable option as would Hudson Yards in New York and areas in Boston.
On Twitter, there was lot of excitement about the potential for Philadelphia to land Amazon. Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney wrote: https://twitter.com/PhillyMayor/status/905807799086612480 We think Philadelphia would be a PRIME location for Amazon that would make people SMILE! Look forward to submitting a proposal!
Josh Kopelman, a Philadelphia entrepreneur who formed First Round Capital, https://twitter.com/joshk/status/905771985556385792 added: "Alright Philly - let's get on this. @PhillyMayor, how can I help?"
Other local chief executives also believe that Philadelphia and the region is well situated to get on Amazon’s radar.
“I think there is probably not one governor or mayor of a major city or real estate developer who read the article and didn’t start making a lot of calls,” said Jerry Sweeney, CEO of Brandwyine Realty Trust. “It will be an intensely competitive process that will require significant state and city support. This is a great chance for the city and commonwealth to showcase a pro-growth agenda.”
Sweeney said he believes Philadelphia is well positioned to attract not only the likes of Amazon but other major companies for a variety of factors including its academic institutions, labor pool and transportation network.
“Amazon is an incredible company driving activity across a vast spectrum of the business landscape,” said Bill Hankowksy, CEO of Liberty Property Trust, noting that its across consumer products, logistics, digital and media. “A headquarters operation for a company like this requires a workforce reflecting these diverse talents. Philadelphia’s academic infrastructure and significant, highly-educated workforce fit the bill perfectly. Philly’s affordability, livability, connectivity and convenience should also contribute to making this city a very compelling option for Amazon.”
If there is one other thing that Philadelphia has going for it is experience in making a regional pitch. Matt Cabrey serves as executive director of Select Greater Philadelphia Council, which is an 11-county, tri-state regional marketing organization that looks to attract and retain companies. Though Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware still compete individually for companies and jobs, the idea that Amazon is seeking a regional response is right in Select’s wheelhouse.
Cabrey was already taking the initial steps to reach out to Select’s economic development partners at the state and county level, come up with a work and communications plan, and delve into its database of statistics on labor, costs, available sites and other details that corporations typically seek when launching a site selection process.
Select is also looking at some other non-traditional approaches to help bolster its case including considering taking a trip out to Seattle to see Amazon’s current campus to see if anything can be gleaned that would help in responding to the RFP and extending an invitation to company officials to come for a visit to Philadelphia. Among Select’s other efforts is to identify those who work at Amazon who are familiar with Philadelphia, whether because they were born here or may have worked in the city or region at some point and can serves as a champion for the region.
“We approach this in a step-by-step process,” Cabrey said. “The goal is we want to be on the shortlist of regions under consideration.”
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