By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Princeton University President Christopher L. Eisgruber touted the benefits his university would have for Amazon, in a message to top company officials at a time when Amazon is looking for where to open a second headquarters.
The university on Wednesday released an Oct. 12 letter that Eisgruber had sent to Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos and CEO of Worldwide Consumer Jeffrey A. Wilke, both Princeton alumni. He stopped short of urging them to put the second headquarters, know as HQ2, in New Jersey, however.
But in the “Dear Jeff and Jeff” letter, Eisgruber said Princeton is “growing its connections with the innovation ecosystem in New Jersey, and I wanted to share with you some of the synergies that might benefit Amazon if you were to join us in the state that we are proud to call home.”
Eisgruber sought to highlight the parts of university life that line up with the things that Amazon is looking for wherever it moves. For instance, he touted the “cultural offerings” and “intellectual enrichment” the university has to offer.
“The (request for proposal) makes it clear that Amazon will be looking to engage with excellent institutions of higher education, partly because of your interest in working with exceptional faculty and students, and partly because your employees can benefit from the intellectual and cultural resources they offer,” Eisgruber wrote.
“Princeton University is increasingly engaging with corporate and other external partners throughout the state, and we would welcome an exploration with Amazon of areas ranging from potential research collaborations and innovation initiatives, to possible internship or recruitment programs,” he wrote. “One of Princeton’s greatest strengths is that it attracts some of the best students from around the country and around the world in all the fields it offers, including the arts, humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering, but the greatest recent growth in student interest has been in what your RFP describes as the ‘most relevant’ majors for your business. The most heavily subscribed undergraduate major at Princeton last year was computer science, and in recent years, seventy percent of all Princeton undergraduates have taken at least one computer science course.”
The letter came out the same week that Gov. Chris Christie announced the state was backing Newark’s bid to be the host city for HQ2, including dangling $7 billion in tax breaks at Amazon.
Amazon, based in Seattle, will look to create some 50,000 jobs in a more than $5 billion investment to open HQ2, as towns across the country clamor for the company to pick them. Thursday is the filing deadline for submitting proposals to the company, according to Amazon spokesman Adam Sedo.
“We will evaluate each one of them,” he said Wednesday in declining to comment on Eisgruber’s letter.
Bezos and Wilke were at Princeton as undergraduates in the 1980s. Bezos graduated in 1986 and Wilke in 1989, according to the university.
“He knows both of them, he knows that Amazon is looking for their second headquarters,” University Vice President and Secretary Robert K. Durkee said Wednesday of Eisgruber. “He knows that there are likely to be at least one, maybe more, proposals coming from New Jersey. And I think what he was doing in the letter was just reminding them that one of the attractions of being in New Jersey, for Amazon, is the opportunity to engage with students and faculty at Princeton University.”
A copy of the Eisgruber letter will go with the official New Jersey proposal to Amazon.
Locally, Mayor Liz Lempert has criticized attempts to lure Amazon to the state with hefty tax breaks that she feels could be used best to aid small businesses.
“I agree a hundred percent that New Jersey and in particular Princeton is a great place for many, many companies to locate for the reasons that were articulated, because of the intellectual capital here, the quality of life, the amazing public schools and institutions like Princeton University,” she said Wednesday. “And I think that’s all the more reason that we shouldn’t be engaged in a race to the bottom where cities and states are handing out tax breaks and everything else.”
