Amazon plans to expand its operations in Mexico with a new distribution center in Tepotzotlán, México state.

“The expansion of Amazon reflects our commitment to Mexico and our obsession with improving the buying experience of customers at all times,” said Diego Méndez de la Luz, Amazon’s director of operations in Mexico.

This will be the second Amazon distribution center in the México state city. The first, currently Amazon’s largest such center in the country, began operations in May 2018 and employs over 1,500 people.

The announcement is a continuation of the rapid expansion that the online retail giant began announcing in Mexico throughout the last half of 2020, spending US $100 million in extending its logistics reach outside of the Mexico City/México state area. Late last year, Amazon announced it would open centers in Umán, Yucatán; Apodaca, Nuevo León; and Tlajomulco, Jalisco.

Amazon opened its online retail store in Mexico in 2015.

Its main online retail competitor in Mexico, Mercado Libre, has also been expanding. In December, it revealed that it had spent US $50.5 million on a new fleet of four cargo planes operating out of the Querétaro international airport to speed up deliveries.

In September Walmart spent 140 million pesos to open its first logistics center in the country in Mérida, Yucatán.

The new distribution center in México state will also mean more local jobs, Amazon said, ranging from floor positions to a variety of administrative jobs. It did not specify how many jobs the new location would provide.

Nevertheless, México state Governor Alfredo Del Mazo Maza said the center will help his state recover from the economic effects of the pandemic.

“Amazon has become one of the principal allies and a strategic partner in the economic recovery and the fulfillment of objectives that have been laid out by the current administration to improve the level of well-being of Mexican families,” he said.

Sources: El Financiero (sp), La Prensa (sp)