If it pays off by helping make Lisbon a strong European tech scene, which it looks like it could do, it's not necessarily a bad deal for the taxpayers of Portugal.

€110m is an absolute bargain for the value that it has generated. Any public official who was involved in making that decision/deal and facilitating the influx of talent/ideas/energy/capital deserves a medal! Lisbon is buzzing now more than ever, thanks in no small part to Web Summit. It was good before, now it's incredible. Say what you want about Web Summit (that's a whole other rant!) it is unquestionably "net positive" to the Portuguese economy and the lives of tens of thousands of people.

It does indeed appear to have been a very smart choice for Lisbon, but that does not address the question of whether this was the main reason for the location selection.

When Paddy (and the WebSummit Team) decided to leave the Dublin chaos, they had a choice between several cities. Lisbon made the best case on many factors. There must have been an "incentive" for them to move beyond simply having a "better venue" or "sunny weather", we (the public) will never have the full picture of the terms of the original "deal" between Paddy and the Lisbon/PT authorities.

Feels like it's been a "win-win" for everyone (except perhaps the "locals" who have no interest in tourism/tech and have been priced out of their rental accommodation by "AirBnB Landlords"... it's the SF apartment price squeeze all over)

If I were to guess the reason for the selection of Lisbon, it would be this: the Web Summit organising team have to spend much of the year in the city where the event is held. They chose a city they want to be in for their own reasons. e.g: Weather/Climate, Food, Culture, Night Life, Scenery (lots of city parks, cycle/pedestrian areas), Architecture, Surf/Sailing, good International Schools (for those who have children) ... Mostly still "cheap" for visitors.

There's a good reason why people say that Lisbon is like SF but with better weather and more affordable.

Lmao. Spoken as someone who doesn't understand healthcare, education or basic social services.

Eu dominates the US for quality of life and standard of living.

Not for long

Care to elaborate? I would love to see some real plans to change my mindset on where the U.S. is heading.

This is probably considered off, so message me

At some point the bureaucratocracy is going to get top heavy. Already the economy is showing signs of being anemic. Common strategy by bureaucrats for curing anemia is top-down investment, which means stealing from the poor (via inflation) to water the privileged. It's inevitable.

Add the US to that list. Amazon HQ2 is a race to the bottom; I'm sure there's other criteria, but at some level that's also just squeezing the most benefits out of the contending cities or regions. And that's just a high profile example.