Amazon suspends Virginia headquarters construction in latest cost-cutting move

Amazon’s placing the development of its second headquarters in Virginia on maintain because it appears to chop prices throughout the corporate, as reported earlier by Bloomberg and CNBC. Whereas Amazon’s nonetheless anticipated to finish the primary part of its headquarters this June, the corporate’s pausing work on the bigger portion of the mission situated throughout the road.

The corporate’s Arlington, Virginia-based headquarters, dubbed HQ2, is meant to encompass two elements: Metropolitan Park, an “city campus” able to housing 25,000 employees, and PenPlace, a posh with three 22-story buildings and a corkscrew-shaped glass tower standing 350 toes tall. PenPlace, the second part of the mission, is the portion affected by the delay.

John Schoettler, Amazon’s head of actual property, confirmed the transfer in an announcement to The Verge. “We’re all the time evaluating area plans to ensure they match our enterprise wants and to create an awesome expertise for workers,” Shoettler explains in an emailed assertion. “And since Met[tropolitan] Park can have area to accommodate greater than 14,000 workers, we’ve determined to shift the groundbreaking of PenPlace out a bit.” It’s nonetheless not clear how lengthy Amazon will pause development, although.

Amazon simply had one in every of its least worthwhile quarters in years

The primary part’s June opening coincides with the corporate’s plans to carry employees again to the workplace for 3 days per week in Might. Based on Bloomberg, Amazon instructed Arlington County Board Chair Christian Dorsey that it “would proceed this yr with allowing on the second part of HQ2,” which signifies it might kick off development on the second part subsequent yr.

“Our second headquarters has all the time been a multiyear mission, and we stay dedicated to Arlington, Virginia, and the higher Capital Area,” Schoettler says.

Amazon determined to plant its sprawling headquarters in Northern Virginia in 2019 after going through huge pushback from New York residents and native lawmakers on its proposed HQ2 plans in Lengthy Island Metropolis, Queens. Virginia supplied Amazon as much as $750 million in incentives to construct its headquarters within the state, with Amazon saying on the time it could make investments over $2.5 billion to construct its campus, “driving the creation of hundreds of oblique jobs in development, constructing companies, hospitality and different companies industries throughout the area.”

The halt in development comes as one more cost-cutting measure for Amazon, which consolidated its {hardware} and companies groups final November and laid off over 18,000 employees in January. This previous quarter, Amazon reported higher web gross sales through the holidays, however nonetheless had one in every of its least worthwhile quarters in years. It earned $0.3 billion for the quarter, down from $14.3 billion on the similar time in 2021, and posted its first web loss since 2014 at $2.7 billion.

However pausing the HQ2 mission isn’t all the corporate’s doing to curtail bills.

CNBC studies that Amazon’s additionally shutting down eight of its bodily Go comfort shops in Seattle, New York Metropolis, and San Francisco. Amazon first introduced that it could shutter a few of its bodily shops throughout its earnings name in February, whereas CEO Andy Jassy indicated that Amazon will even gradual the growth of its Recent supermarkets till it finds a format that “resonates with clients.”

“Like all bodily retailer, we periodically assess our portfolio of shops and make optimization selections alongside the best way,” Amazon spokesperson Jessica Martin says in an emailed assertion to The Verge. “On this case, we’ve determined to shut a small variety of Amazon Go shops in Seattle, New York Metropolis, and San Francisco. We stay dedicated to the Amazon Go format, function greater than 20 Amazon Go shops throughout the U.S., and can proceed to study which places and options resonate most with clients as we preserve evolving our Amazon Go shops.” 

Replace March 4th, 2:18PM ET: Up to date so as to add statements from John Schoettler and an Amazon spokesperson.

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