Amazon Canada has announced plans for a new fulfillment centre in Ottawa, Ontario’s eastern suburb of Orléans. The 1-million square foot customer fulfillment facility is Amazon’s fifth in Ontario, creating more than 600 full-time jobs with benefits starting on day one. Amazon currently employs more than 2,000 full-time associates (they variously call staff that or sometimes Amazonians) at its existing Ontario facilities in Brampton, Mississauga, and Milton.
Ontario continues to be a great place for Amazon to do business and we look forward to adding a fulfillment centre in the National Capital Region. Our ability to expand in Ontario and create more than 600 new jobs is the result of two things: incredible customers and an outstanding workforce. Amazon is committed to providing great opportunities for employment and creating a positive economic impact for the region.
– Glenn Sommerville, Director of Amazon Operations in Canada
It’s no surprise that Amazon Canada continues to expand its employee and facility footprint in North America and expansion in Canada, where Amazon has been very successful, is part of its seemingly non-stop march forward in the region. But this news does also serve as a reminder that not much has been heard lately from Amazon about its search for a new headquarters.
It’s been billed as HQ2 and Amazon has put out a set of requirements it wants from the new facility and metropolitan area where it will be located. We’ve written quite a bit about HQ2 already on Tamebay. Competition has been fierce from mayors and cities keen to get on the shortlist and win the HQ2 prize.
Amazon promises that HQ2 will be the workplace, in due course, for 50k well-paid, highly skilled individuals. The development of the site and the ongoing activity will be a huge economic boost to any city. So far, it seems likely that a United States city will be the winner. But despite much speculation, a front-runner has yet to emerge.
But will there be an announcement any time soon? We would expect so. And we’ll keep you posted.
One Response
A large portion of Canada,s population live very close to the American border. So it makes sense that Amazon has an expansion strategy for Canada. Amazon can utilise its fulfilment centres not only for b2c but also b2b. Note that at the moment Amazon does not have a dedicated Canadian website for b2b and maybe this is something that Amazon is looking at and hence the warehouse expansion.