Bids from municipalities hoping to lure Amazon's second headquarters are due Thursday. Detroit is one of the prospects, and a win would certainly be a huge change for the city and region.
But if you listen to analysts, Detroit doesn't have much of a shot, John Gallagher and Susan Tompor of the Detroit Free Press write:
Most analysts' rankings of potential winners of Amazon's new headquarters place Detroit far down the list of cities likely to win. Amazon, based in Seattle, said its second headquarters will bring up to 50,000 jobs and billions of dollars to the city it chooses, with an announcement expected next year.
A few weeks ago, the New York Times' Upshot team of data analysts applied Amazon's several pages of search criteria to 60 U.S. cities and eliminated 59 of them, dubbing Denver the likely winner.
In that analysis, Detroit, along with more than half of the other 60 cities, didn't even make the first cut, eliminated for not providing what Amazon called a “stable business climate for growth.”
Detroit didn't fare too well, either, in a ranking by Anderson Economic Group of East Lansing. Detroit ranked in 32nd place out of 35 cities ranked. Cities ranking even lower were Sacramento, Kansas City and San Jose at No. 35.
This three-and-a-half-minute video is part of the city's application:
