Amazon selects New York, Virginia for new headquarters

Amazon5After over a year of speculation, e-commerce giant Amazon has announced it will open its new headquarters in New York City and Arlington, Northern Virginia, and expects to create 50,000 jobs across the regions.

Amazon founder and chief executive Jeff Bezos said the locations would help the company to attract world-class talent.

The New York City headquarters will be located across the East River in Long Island City, while the Arlington headquarters will be based in National Landing, less than three miles from downtown Washington, D.C.

Both areas will see Amazon invest in the realm of US$2.5 billion (approximately $3.5 billion), while employees in each area will enjoy an average salary of US$150,000 (approximately $207,600) per year.

GlobalData Retail managing director Neil Saunders offered a theory as to why Amazon decided to split its headquarters across two cities.

“In our view, the split reflects two things,” Saunders said.

“First of all, the sheer size and scale of Amazon and its interest across many areas of technology, retail, and various consumer services. This arguably warrants multiple HQ locations as opposed to a couple of large offices.

“Second, Amazon’s forecasted strong growth means it wants to avoid the issues it had in Seattle where its expansion caused problems with the supply of labor, property, and put pressure on general infrastructure. Being able to balance growth across numerous cities would help alleviate such issues.”

According to Saunders, there is further logic to the locations that Amazon selected, since New York serves as a global hub for many of the areas Amazon want to expand in, such as fashion and finance, while Arlington, being in close proximity to Washington, allows greater political links – something the business may need as it continues to grow.

 

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