Amazon Rome, New York: Building the Digital Future: Dear Mr. Bezos, Will All Roads Lead to Amazon Rome, New York in the Future? Griffiss Tech Park, Rome, New York: Global Epicenter of Digital Transformation for the Future.

1. February 19th, 2019: Yogesh Malhotra, PhD, http://YogeshMalhotra.com/
Amazon Rome, New York: Building the Digital Future
Griffiss Tech Park, Rome, New York
Global Epicenter of Digital Transformation for the Future
Dear Mr. Bezos, Will All Roads Lead to Amazon Rome,
New York in the Future?

2. Greetings Jeff,
It has been my pleasure and a privilege communicating with you and your colleagues
as a life-long customer of Amazon since you founded Amazon. Your customer-centric
focus and ‘day one’ execution of ongoing innovation has earned the admiration and
appreciation of global customers including myself. I have also enjoyed getting to know
about the latest digital innovations at Amazon including the latest moonshot
project(s) from many of your colleagues, managers, and, directors over the last
several years.
In an earlier invited presentation at your Alma matter, Princeton University, I shared
how Amazon surpasses the smartest Finance-IT firms including top hedge funds in
capitalizing upon continuing digital innovation. Today, I am writing to you in that role
as a digital strategist and technologist whose vision as laid out in R&D adopted
worldwide can be best seen in the real-life execution of Amazon. I am also writing to
you as 18-year resident of New York who has lived and worked across the State while
making this community of engineers, doctors, and, other professionals my family
home for over a decade. I am writing to share with you my excitement about this
gem of a location with updated version of related presentation shared few months
ago as the global epicenter for the future global digital transformation of the world.
Its original version sparked the imagination and excitement of the senior leadership
team of Managing Directors and motivated the firm to prepare a related press release
for the planned launch.

3. This gem of a location is Griffiss Park in Rome, New York, home of the famed Air Force
Research Lab (AFRL) pioneering computing, internet, and, cybersecurity innovations
since advent of Internet by DARPA. Rome is the home of the Griffiss Air Force Base
and Griffiss International Airport, the nucleus of the unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)
test site for the States of New York and Massachusetts. Having lived around the
world, including next to Central Park in midtown Manhattan, NYC, I truly think that
Rome provides unmatched quality-of-living, cost-of-living, and, housing costs for your
employees and partners. Living in a W 58th St apartment, two blocks from Central
Park, I came to realize that what Dale Carnegie had written in his best-selling book
about cockroach infestation of NYC about 100-years ago when living at W 56th St was
even truer today. Moreover, I couldn’t even see a glimpse of the sun or the sky from
my windows surrounded by the concrete jungle. I used to yearn for the bluest of blue
skies reflecting in bluest of blue waters proximal to the greenest of green meadows at
this place I call home. Compelling incentives for relocation and expansion.
Empire Zone (EZ) tax incentives
Financing, loan underwriting and administration
Zoned and shovel-ready sites affording immediate
development potential
Real estate development and leasing
Small business development assistance
Centralized economic development effort that cuts
through red tape
Excellent public / private sector cooperation
Proven state-level support

4. Your real estate, infrastructure, and, development costs would be sliced to a fraction
while contributing to regional technological and economic development instead of
overstretching already stretched and compressed metropolises. Many of smartest
technical professionals in places such as Toronto, New York City, Boston, Washington
D.C., and, Philadelphia would be an hour’s flight from your Amazon Rome, NY
headquarters and would be able to afford the best of both worlds. They would get to
work with world’s most advanced global technology firm in a hi-tech robust
ecosystem while being able to afford much better quality-of-living, cost-of-living, and,
housing costs – a combination they otherwise can’t afford. With some of the best
New York state schools, they shall also be able to afford residential homes with back
yards, front lawns, and, cul-de-sacs at a fraction of the cost in any of other cities.
Furthermore, surrounding tech corridor provides plentiful supply of highly trained
professional technical talent served by the State University of New York, the largest
comprehensive system of higher education in the United States, with 64 campuses
located within 30 miles of every home, school and business. The Wizard of Omaha
doesn't live in Wall Street district, nor do founders of most valuable tech companies
in Silicon Valley. Similarly, many of the smartest minds pioneering smartest
technologies go about quietly doing what they do leading worldwide hi-tech
advancements from the Rome AFRL-Griffiss ecosystem encompassing the New York
state hi-tech corridor spanning Buffalo, NY and the State capital, Albany. For those
who love the outdoors, we have the Adirondacks Mountains, where the founder of
Alibaba, Jack Ma, purchased a 28,000-acre spread for $23 million.

5. We also have wine country with Finger Lakes and the highest mountain range in the
State of New York past Ithaca, the home of the Cornell University. Near there is the
world headquarters of Corning whose CEO serves on your Amazon Board of Directors.
Cryptocurrency enthusiasts may like to know that we even had out-of-state firms
such as from Puerto Rico setting up cryptocurrency mining operations in the vicinity
given some of the cheapest electricity rates in the country which inspired local
council to regulate the supply to safeguard interests of locals.
Rome, NY has two additional international airports, one on each side, in Albany and
in Syracuse. These are connected by the world’s most efficient interstate freeway
system which forms a key supply chain route for the northern USA and Canada. In
worst winter weather, while locals were digging out of snow in Syracuse, I reached
Syracuse University with ample time at hand while teaching there as a professor.
Then, I came to know that the university had closed after declaring a snow
emergency. Yes, unlike other places where I have lived such as the beaches of Florida
or the deserts of Nevada, we have real four seasons here, including real snow. In fact,
my latest Princeton University presentation highlights precisely how this
environment, unlike many other cities, provides the best test bed rivalling the one in
Finland that Google has been considering for its UAVs. In addition, given focus on
diversity, we can have the best of both worlds – diverse rugged environment and
people who go about their business as usual even in snow and others who want to
come here to enjoy real winter weather among the four seasons.

6. For those who love shopping malls, we have one of the world’s most famous
shopping malls just off I-90 in Syracuse that draws tourists and visitors from Canada
and neighboring states in addition to locals.
The last but not the least is the people in this local Mohawk Valley and Rome and
neighboring areas such as Utica and New Hartford. They are some of the most
wonderful and welcoming people even though many of them have lived their whole
lives here. Having called this place home for more than a decade since moving family
here while a faculty at Syracuse, I have had the pleasure of getting to know,
collaborate with, and, work with many of them. It will be my privilege to help get
Amazon stakeholders introduced with some of the local leaders, movers, and, shakers
of this place we discussed just a few years ago as the future Cyber Valley in a meeting
of senior leaders of the Rome Lab and the local engineering leaders.
Kind regards, Yogi
Yogesh Malhotra, PhD
Who’s Who in America®, Who’s Who in the World®, Who’s Who in Finance &
Industry®, Who’s Who in Science & Engineering®.
Dr.Yogesh.Malhotra@gmail.com
http://www.yogeshmalhotra.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/yogeshmalhotra/

8. Griffiss: Cutting-edge tech
capabilities used nationally:
e.g. neuromorphic-quantum
computing.

32. February 19th, 2019: Yogesh Malhotra, PhD, http://YogeshMalhotra.com/
Amazon Rome, New York: Building the Digital Future
Griffiss Tech Park, Rome, New York
Global Epicenter of Digital Transformation for the Future
Dear Mr. Bezos, Will All Roads Lead to Amazon Rome,
New York in the Future?