Amazon scraps plan for New York HQ

AMAZON will not move forward with plans to build a second headquarters, to be based in New York, after rising opposition from local politicians.

The company said it will not reopen the search process for the second headquarters “at this time”.

It said it would proceed as planned with expansion in Northern Virginia and Nashville, “and we will continue to hire and grow across our 17 corporate offices and tech hubs in the US and Canada”.

The company had begun considering alternatives last week. It had not yet acquired any land for the project, which would make it easy to scrap its plans, a source said.

Amazon had announced it would create 25,000 jobs and build one of two new headquarters in the Long Island City area in the borough of Queens, just across the East River from Manhattan.

The proposal ran into opposition from local politicians who opposed the $2.8bn (€2.4bn) in incentives promised to Amazon in a deal secretly negotiated by Governor Andrew Cuomo and City Mayor Bill de Blasio.