Orlando loses bid to become Amazon’s second headquarters

The City of Orlando lost its bid to become the home of Amazon’s second headquarters Thursday after the shipping giant released a list of 20 cities that made the final cut.

Miami was the only city in Florida among the finalists. The other major metropolitans still in the race for Amazon HQ2 include Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, Nashville, Newark, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Toronto, Washington D.C., Indianapolis and Columbus. Smaller regions like Montgomery County in Maryland, Raleigh in North Carolina, and Northern Virginia in Virginia also made the cut.

City officials told Orlando Weekly last month that Orlando’s bid for HQ2 was being lead by Enterprise Florida and the Orlando Economic Partnership. The city couldn’t disclose details on its proposal because of exemptions in Florida’s public records law regarding trade secrets.

“We received a request … to keep all plans, intentions or interests of the company confidential and exempt,” said Cassandra Lafser, spokesperson for Mayor Buddy Dyer’s office, in an email. 

Amazon picked the final 20 cities out of 238 applications in the U.S., Mexico and Canada. The company says it expects to invest over $5 billion in the construction of HQ2 and create as many as 50,000 high-paying jobs. The second headquarters will be a full equal to Amazon’s original headquarters in Seattle.

This article appears in Jan 17-23, 2018.