General Electric HQ (Necco Buildings Reno) | 5 Necco Street | Fort Point

[Arlington]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

At this point why not give everybody tax breaks. That will move the economy.
Why take any risks when everything is funded by the Middle Class Taxpayers?

I am sympathetic. And yet it is hard to think of a company better than GE at having synergies--on that funny boundary between competitor and supplier/customer--with Boston's existing business community in healthcare equipment & biotech, and close to whatever MIT is cooking up in energy and materials. And GE will always have a finger in finance/capital, regardless of how GE Capital ebbs out/flows back.

Way better than spending that kind of $ and only getting an Olympics or a major league stadium.

 

[whighlander]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I am sympathetic. And yet it is hard to think of a company better than GE at having synergies--on that funny boundary between competitor and supplier/customer--with Boston's existing business community in healthcare equipment & biotech, and close to whatever MIT is cooking up in energy and materials. And GE will always have a finger in finance/capital, regardless of how GE Capital ebbs out/flows back.

Way better than spending that kind of $ and only getting an Olympics or a major league stadium.

Now official confirmed on GE "Digital Stationary"

GE Moves Headquarters to Boston
January 13, 2016

FAIRFIELD, Conn. - GE today announced that it has selected Boston for its corporate headquarters location.

“GE aspires to be the most competitive company in the world,” said GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt. “Today, GE is a $130 billion high-tech global industrial company, one that is leading the digital transformation of industry. We want to be at the center of an ecosystem that shares our aspirations. Greater Boston is home to 55 colleges and universities. Massachusetts spends more on research & development than any other region in the world, and Boston attracts a diverse, technologically-fluent workforce focused on solving challenges for the world. We are excited to bring our headquarters to this dynamic and creative city.”

GE has been considering the composition and location of its headquarters for more than three years. The Company began its formal review in June 2015, with a list of 40 potential locations. Boston was selected after a careful evaluation of the business ecosystem, talent, long-term costs, quality of life for employees, connections with the world and proximity to other important company assets....

The content of GE’s headquarters will also change, with more emphasis on innovation. In Boston, GE will have roughly 800 people; 200 from corporate staff and 600 digital industrial product managers, designers and developers split between GE Digital, Current, robotics and Life Sciences. A GE Digital Foundry will be created for co-creation, incubation and product development with customers, startups and partners. The remainder of administration will be placed in shared service operations throughout the Company...

The headquarters will be located in the Seaport District of Boston. Employees will move to a temporary location in Boston starting in the summer of 2016, with a full move completed in several steps by 2018. GE will host a public briefing in Boston with government officials, and business and community leaders, on February 18, 2016.

So I guess we should all expect a major Whoop-de-Do somewhere [BCEC?] on next Monday

 

[tangent]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I am sympathetic. And yet it is hard to think of a company better than GE at having synergies--on that funny boundary between competitor and supplier/customer--with Boston's existing business community in healthcare equipment & biotech, and close to whatever MIT is cooking up in energy and materials. And GE will always have a finger in finance/capital, regardless of how GE Capital ebbs out/flows back.

Way better than spending that kind of $ and only getting an Olympics or a major league stadium.

Yes, GE has the right mix of business and technology for the future and many connections to Boston and the Boston area to make this sound like it could make for a long term move. Alone it is a win. And the potential to attract other companies to the area and spur some additional redevelopment of the area are wins.

 

[whighlander]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Yes, GE has the right mix of business and technology for the future and many connections to Boston and the Boston area to make this sound like it could make for a long term move. Alone it is a win. And the potential to attract other companies to the area and spur some additional redevelopment of the area are wins.

Tangent -- I think that somewhere Tommy is grinnin -- Mahty has finished pouring of the foundation for the Innovation District in the Hub of Innovation

This makes the Red Line / Silver Line the Innovation Line -- tying Kendall to the Seaport Innovation District

When you start to add all the synergies between IBM's Watson Health and GE's imaging technologies; GE state-of-the-art manufacturing and their own robotics and Rethink Robotics; GE's manufacturing and the MIT.NANO -- this is going to be a truly exciting era for our region

 

[TomOfBoston]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Many in CT are upset that MA stole GE from them. But CT stole GE from NY decades ago the same way: incentives.

 

[stefal]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I hope (not saying it will happen, but hoping is fun) that this move will cause other major companies to relocate or expand their offices to Boston. Companies like IBM, Google, Microsoft, HP, etc. Obviously these major tech giants wouldn't move their headquarters here, but satellite offices would be a great addition for the Seaport, IMO, and they may possibly lead the Seaport in a new direction other than biotech.

 

[datadyne007]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I wonder if we could get GE to subsidize Late Night T...

 

[CSTH]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Note to ArchBoston: We are subsidizing GE, not the other way around....

 

[lapradetom]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Maybe Don Chiofaro can get GE to partner for a spectacular new Headquarters tower on the Waterfront....and to pre-empt the firestorm of complaints, FREE GE appliances to every neighbor in Harbor Towers!

 

[datadyne007]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Note to ArchBoston: We are subsidizing GE, not the other way around....

I'm well aware and I'm not very happy about it. I think we should get something out of GE. If the State/City can afford a $145 million tax break, it can afford $14 mil for Late Night T (that's for another thread), but why not just offer a sponsorship to GE? Idc if it becomes "Late Night T Sponsored by GE™" or w/e.

 

[CSTH]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

Fair enough - I respect your optimism, but I don't share it....

 

[datadyne007]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

GE also left CT to dodge an increase in corporate taxes related to funding a massive multi-modal infrastructure overhaul.

GE's money also won't be going to MA because they store it all off-shore and are perhaps the biggest tax evaders in the country.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/pol...tml?s_campaign=bostonglobe:socialflow:twitter

 

[393b40]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I hope (not saying it will happen, but hoping is fun) that this move will cause other major companies to relocate or expand their offices to Boston. Companies like IBM, Google, Microsoft, HP, etc. Obviously these major tech giants wouldn't move their headquarters here, but satellite offices would be a great addition for the Seaport, IMO, and they may possibly lead the Seaport in a new direction other than biotech.

You do realize several of those companies listed plus a bunch others that should be in that group but aren't explicitly mentioned have major satellite offices in Cambridge right?

 

[stellarfun]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

More detail from the New York Times.

...the remaining 600 [of the 800] will be mainly “digital industrial product managers, designers and developers” in a variety of disciplines including data analysis, life sciences and robotics.

The new headquarters will be leaner, faster and more open with a constant flow of industry partners, customers and innovators, G.E. executives say. The intent, they say, is that it will be more like walking into a start-up in an urban setting than the remote suburban headquarters of the past.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/14/t...-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well


As noted earlier, think of an Innovation Lab on steroids. From the description above, should be a great boon to extended stay hotels. The 600 person industrial design staff aren't going into a tower, think more of an industrial loft type building.

IMO, because of the outside parties collaboration, the industrial design part may be sized to support more like 1,000 or 1,500 people, rather than 600. Most of those collaborators will be traveling through Logan. And they won't be looking for / needing late night T-service.

Harvard's I-lab has been open for four years, and the visitor total is over 200,000; staff probably doesn't exceed 20.
https://i-lab.harvard.edu/explore/about/by-the-numbers/

 

[Mongo]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

I hope (not saying it will happen, but hoping is fun) that this move will cause other major companies to relocate or expand their offices to Boston. Companies like IBM, Google, Microsoft, HP, etc. Obviously these major tech giants wouldn't move their headquarters here, but satellite offices would be a great addition for the Seaport, IMO, and they may possibly lead the Seaport in a new direction other than biotech.

IBM, Google, and Microsoft already have satellite offices in Kendall, not sure about HP.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

GE also left CT to dodge an increase in corporate taxes related to funding a massive multi-modal infrastructure overhaul.

GE's money also won't be going to MA because they store it all off-shore and are perhaps the biggest tax evaders in the country.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/pol...tml?s_campaign=bostonglobe:socialflow:twitter

Expensive campus to own/maintain, longstanding corporate desire to reduce the onsite staff, no easy way to lower their overhead or bring in other tenants. Ultimately the bunkered-in 70's office park setup was obsolete for the telecommute era, and the only way GE was going to stay there is if their taxes got absolute-zeroed out. They were threatening this for years, every year a new spin on the threat. CT got sick of the appeasement games, knowing the hostage-taking would never end. And so they basically drew-down negotiations without ever really stopping them once it became clear it was going to be a fool's game to continue bidding against themselves.

I actually consider that somewhat of a sign of growth via applied knowledge from my state of birth. The last 30 years of CT biz history have seemingly been one giant game of appeasement chicken with every bloated industrial HQ in the state. Yet somehow it's 2016 and after all the losses the Capitol dome is still standing and the standard of living better than it was during the early-90's recession. Perhaps because the alternative--offshoring that was going to happen anyway, and giving up the farm on tax revenue--wasn't going to be anyone's victory.


Article's get it pretty much right. It's a really nice win--right location, right time...and especially right time for the location. But it can't be measured against bygone "company town" eras that no longer exist. After all, GE's giveth and taketh...and taketh and taketh some more...in recent Mass. biz history so I don't think anybody was naive about who they were dancing with. The way the breaking news was deliberately under-hyped by those in power seems to indicate that they have right-sized expectations about the impact: unequivocal win, but not some gold-encrusted title belt we had to seek out of desperation. That seems to be more a Rhode Island thing these days.

 

[stefal]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

IBM, Google, and Microsoft already have satellite offices in Kendall, not sure about HP.

I stand corrected.

 

[type001]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

^I *think* HP has a major office in Framingfish, Hopkinton, or somewhere closeby.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

^I *think* HP has a major office in Framingfish, Hopkinton, or somewhere closeby.

Maynard (probably other MetroWest locales too, but mainly Maynard).

DEC ==> Compaq ==> HP is the corporate evolution of that campus through cycles of mergers and downsizing.

 

[stellarfun]

Re: General Electric HQ | TBD | Innovation District

HP has split into two companies. HP Enterprise (the non-consumer side) has operations in Cambridge, Southborough, Andover, Littleton, and administrative-consultant-sales operations in Boston, Hingham, North Quincy.