“This is just the start”. Amazon makes location of first Australian fulfilment centre official
Cloud computing and e-commerce giant Amazon made news of its first Australian fulfilment centre official this morning.
As speculated, the group is leasing a 24,387 square metre facility at 29 National Drive, Dandenong South – a property recently marketed as “the best distribution centre in Melbourne’s south-east”, but vacated more than a year ago, by Bunnings, which upgraded.
The warehouse was last advertised for rent asking just over $1.8 million a year (or $75 per square metre, per annum), less incentives.
“This new fulfilment centre will stock hundreds of thousands of products which will be available for delivery to customers across Australia when we launch our retail offering,” Amazon’s Australian director of operations, Richard Bruce, said in a statement with Wade Noonan, Industry Minister for Victoria.
“This is just the start. Over time, we will bring thousands of new jobs to Australia and millions of dollars of investment as well as opening up the opportunity for thousands of Australian businesses to sell at home and abroad through Amazon Marketplace”.
The complex is in Pellicano’s M2 Industry Park.
Amazon made no reference to speculation it could expand the Dandenong South fulfilment centre into a vacant tract of land to the north. Coincidentally, another factory is vacant and seeking a buyer, on the neighbouring block, to the south.
“Amazon is the latest global company to choose Victoria for its Australian operations,” said Wade Noonan, Industry Minister for Victoria. “The company’s decision to locate its centre in Dandenong South will create hundreds of local jobs and open up retail opportunities for thousands of local businesses.