Austin Makes the Top 20 List of Finalists for Amazon’s New Headquarters
As if we needed further proof that Austin is a business-friendly city with a highly-skilled workforce, Amazon recently announced that our city is in the running to be home to the company’s second US headquarters, HQ2.
Amazon made the announcement that it was looking for a location for HQ2 on September 7, and that ideal candidates would be metropolitan areas with more than one million people, an international airport, great talent, good mass transit and a vibrant downtown. In short order, the company had received 238 applications from cities, states and provinces stretching from Canada to Mexico.
On January 18, Amazon announced that of those 238 applicants, Austin had been selected as one of 20 finalists in the running to become the site of a new $5 billion headquarters—and bring in an estimated 50,000 jobs over a decade. The other Texas city to make the list was Dallas. Houston wasn’t named a finalist, and San Antonio didn’t throw its hat in the ring.
Besides Austin and Dallas, the list of finalists includes:
- Atlanta, GA
- Boston, MA
- Chicago, IL
- Columbus, OH
- Denver, CO
- Indianapolis, IN
- Los Angeles, CA
- Miami, FL
- Montgomery County, MD
- Nashville, TN
- Newark, NJ
- New York City, NY
- Northern Virginia, VA
- Philadelphia, PA
- Pittsburgh, PA
- Raleigh, NC
- Toronto, ON
- Washington D.C.
Now, Amazon is tasked with closely evaluating each finalist’s proposal and ask for additional information as needed. As part of the process, it will evaluate the candidates’ workforces for compatibility. The company expects to make a decision in 2018.
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