Quick Question: Did Ford Buy A Building This Week?
Ford, like every automaker, is racing to develop autonomous driving technology and deploy a slate of electric vehicles. So, we're told, it bought a building. Game changer, baby.
See?
Ford's purchase of Detroit's Central Station shows the company is invested in revitalizing the city. But it's also a sign that Ford is willing to do what it takes to compete with Silicon Valley tech giants for high-caliber talent https://t.co/ACB3zsUO9S
— WIRED (@WIRED) June 20, 2018
Besides the symbolism for Detroit's "rebirth," Ford's downtown move expands the automaker's symbolic stake in the self-driving, connected, semi-communal transportation future. https://t.co/M3BY8sRKSs
— Laura Bliss (@mslaurabliss) June 19, 2018
Ford plans to make a tech hub out of an 18-story beaux-arts building that's long been symbol of Detroit's blight—with busted-out windows, graffiti-covered walls and razor-wire fencing https://t.co/xGtvETVMTM
— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) June 19, 2018
Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. just laid out plans to turn a century old Detroit train station into its new hub for autonomous & electric vehicles. He discusses that and competing with Tesla with @gayleking only on @CBSThisMorning pic.twitter.com/Fz4y3j6P9Q
— ryan kadro (@RyanKadro) June 20, 2018
We've noted in recent days the significance of the train station's purchase, but damn, all this PR for the purchase of a building that Ford was, as the executive chairman put it, "prepared to walk away if it was the wrong deal." I'd love to get this kind of goodwill for buying an old property at a low-cost and using public tax incentives to renovate it.