Amazon looking to expand. $5B investment.

[rage2]

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Somebody watched "The Founder"

Great movie btw.

Nah, I've read Ray Kroc's book, and knew about it long ago.

[tonytiger55]

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You would think they will hire Calgarians?

They will probably look at immigration policies and do imports from Asia. Something tough to do in Trump's America. Housing is cheaper than Vancouver so salary will be relatively low. The only problem is the risk of energy sector coming back to life, then we become too expensive.

Starting wage for tech sector in Seattle and Silicon Valley is $150-$200US. You can almost do 2:1 in Calgary in term of staff cost alone and not have to worry about housing cost like Vancouver and Toronto.

But let's be serious here, Canada will not be as competitive to the states. Texas can probably promise $1B in tax or land subsidies to have them set up in Austin.



Amazon will also be a sweat shop. It's hard for Smart to find talent is because we got not much to start with and they would rather go digging holes for $200K than writing code for $100K.

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I know a manager there who's team is bunch of junior java developers. If you have anything in Solium, I'd recommend to sell to cover and opt to receive a certificate and deposit into TFSA.

- - - Updated - - -

That's because they are out of touch with the Calgary market and pay shit. In IT circles it was widely considered as a "sweat shop."

It probably was (Smart=Sweatshop), and I don't think was was clear in my post.
The Director is from the UK like myself. It was a snip bit of a much indepth conversation wider than SMART itself.
Writing code and talent are two separate things. The issue was talent pool. Go to Silicon valley and you have a big range of talent. Here its not so much, so harder to innovate, it not to say there is no talent, there definitely is. So you have to create the foundation that will attract talent. But yes salary is a factor. Also the population of Calgary is low, like really low. I hear 1 million is a lot, but break that up into the demo graphics of old people, bro dogs, wohoo girls etc. Its not a big population density over a large area of land.

Some of the talented IT people I have met actually left Calgary/north America to London and Asia. That was a interesting insight.

Calgary does have some positives, housing is one, close proximity to the mountains, hardly any traiffc (Deerfoot is like a clear Auto bahn compared to the M25 and north Circular in London)one of the best tasting water in the world (DO NOT JUDGE TILL YOU TASTE LONDON TAP WATER), its one of the reasons why I moved here. But I think the city planning needs to change the way it designs commercial districts. They are waay out of touch.

But Since Amazon are in the Grocery Business now. Calgary is a pretty good gateway to supply the north and Prairies east. The big issue here is transport costs. The population density is really low and may not be worthwhile.

I don't see them coming here unfortunately.

[adamc]

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Nah, I've read Ray Kroc's book, and knew about it long ago.

well la dee dah, look at this guy, reads books

[rage2]

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Some of the talented IT people I have met actually left Calgary/north America to London and Asia. That was a interesting insight.

It was impossible to compete with O&G for tech talent in Calgary, until now. We've had so many talented people come through our doors, only to take a bigger offer with O&G. It made tech really tough to hire for in Calgary, so I can see why SMART struggled. It's not that there aren't talented techies in Calgary, it's that they chased money, either with easy work at O&G, or elsewhere.

[rage2]

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well la dee dah, look at this guy, reads books

Just autobiographies haha. Gotta learn from successful people.

[Tik-Tok]

I was just thinking, you know what a guaranteed way for Amazon to scratch Calgary off the list? Bill 203.

[kertejud2]

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Nah, I've read Ray Kroc's book, and knew about it long ago.

Did you do your part to woo Amazon here by at least reading it on a Kindle?

[rage2]

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Did you do your part to woo Amazon here by at least reading it on a Kindle?

Sorta, Kindle app on iPad.

Honestly, even if we are a good fit, there is no way we can beat the US when it comes to handouts to businesses. To get Amazon here, the incentives would make the CalgaryNEXT proposal and "city money to businesses" look like a rounding error lol.

[Buster]

[mrsingh]

As awesome as this would be for the city, they are doing the right thing bidding for it, does anyone actually believe this will happen? As others have mentioned, will the local and provincial government be willing to deal with the political fallout with giving private companies handouts? Additionally with it being a headquarters, are their executives going to even want to travel back and forth to Canada as required along with some likely having to relocate? I do see the attraction for the visa rules bringing in tech workers from overseas compared to all that is happening with the political climate down in the US.

Either way, it is a massive longshot.

[kertejud2]

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As awesome as this would be for the city, they are doing the right thing bidding for it, does anyone actually believe this will happen?

I'd say we are probably definitely maybe at least the second best Canadian option for it.

So that's something.

[dj_patm]

I dont think there would be any significant political fallout from chasing the best shot of a lifeline Calgary could ever get.

[rage2]

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I dont think there would be any significant political fallout from chasing the best shot of a lifeline Calgary could ever get.

75% of Alberta disagrees haha. Regardless, even if we give all we can provincially, hard to say if federal will follow suit, at least from a taxation standpoint.

[dj_rice]

Edmonton's throwing their bid in as well

[HiTempguy1]

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75% of Alberta disagrees haha. Regardless, even if we give all we can provincially, hard to say if federal will follow suit, at least from a taxation standpoint.

What? I don't understand, are you referencing the flames arena? Cause that is bullshit and wont bring 50,000 jobs to the city or $5bil in investment.

[kertejud2]

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75% of Alberta disagrees haha. Regardless, even if we give all we can provincially, hard to say if federal will follow suit, at least from a taxation standpoint.

Just make the Olympic Village and Media Centre convertible to 8M square feet of space. Fits right on with the timeline and it's finding valuable use for bloated Olympic infrastructure. It's perfect.

The 19,000 arena seats can be 'open-concept work stations' during business hours while all the luxury suites can be flex rooms.

[rage2]

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What? I don't understand, are you referencing the flames arena? Cause that is bullshit and wont bring 50,000 jobs to the city or $5bil in investment.

No, I mean Calgary is only 25% of Alberta.

[HiTempguy1]

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No, I mean Calgary is only 25% of Alberta.

Man, I'm in Edmonton and I can get behind Calgary getting this. You guys got shitkicked way worse than we did. Ndp is already supporting Edmonton lol.

[mrsingh]

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75% of Alberta disagrees haha. Regardless, even if we give all we can provincially, hard to say if federal will follow suit, at least from a taxation standpoint.

Justin Trudeau has talked quite a bit about attracting tech companies to Canada, here is a chance for him to put his money where his mouth is.

I work in O&G and have stayed employed thankfully - but had to take a role at site to do it. I would fully support whatever incentives it takes to bring this to the city, we as a city and province need to diversify.

CNBC (obviously US biased) ran a couple articles ranking and narrowing the cities down. In the end in one of the articles they chose Denver as the best bet.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/07/here...dquarters.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/09/dear...s-for-you.html

I still just don't see us being all that competitive that is all, I honestly hope I am proved wrong here.

[Tik-Tok]

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Justin Trudeau has talked quite a bit about attracting tech companies to Canada, here is a chance for him to put his money where his mouth is.

When he says Canada, he means Quebec and Ontario, where his voters are.