Amazon's treasure trove of data

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When Amazon invited cities to compete for its second global headquarters a year ago today, it got reams of data from the 238 entrants — enough to learn details of the cities' future plans that a lot of their residents don't even know about. The information effectively provided Amazon with a database chock full of granular details about the economic development prospects of every major metropolitan area in the United States (and some in Canada). For a rapidly-expanding tech behemoth like Amazon, that database could help it make expansion decisions that go way beyond the new headquarters. Much of the quantitative data that Amazon picked up from cities is publicly available. What matters is the qualitative data cities offered up — they let Amazon in on their wildest dreams.


Amazon's treasure trove of data