New Business Announcements: Q1/24
These announcements represent companies that are either establishing new operations in the region, relocating to the region, or expanding their existing operations in the area.
CATEGORY
The bulk of activity involved the expansion of existing, Houston-area operations, which totaled 97 projects in Q1 2024, a 322 percent increase over the 23 announced during Q1 2023. These are companies that already have establishments in the Houston area and have either expanded their real estate footprint in the area or have added a significant number of new jobs.
A total of 40 businesses established new facilities in the Houston area in 2024, a decrease of 18 percent from 49 companies new to the region during Q1 2023.
To qualify as a “new business announcement,” the project must disclose at least one of the following: jobs created, capital investment, and/or footage of office or industrial space leased. However, only a small fraction of the new business announcements disclosed more than one of these values. As a result, the Partnership’s analysis of capital investment, employment, and square footage represents a low-ball estimate for new business activity. Of the 139 announcements, 13 provided employment information totaling 1,725 new jobs, nine on the capital investment totaling $304.5 million, and 133 on space occupied totaling 7.7 million square feet.
YEAR-OVER-YEAR
Q1 2024 logged 139 announcements, a 93 percent increase over Q1 2023 when 72 projects were announced. The significant rise is partly attributed to the Partnership tapping new information sources, such as Google Alerts and CoStar reports.
Q1 2024 New Business Announcements Summary:
- 139 announced projects
- 13 projects reported 1,725 new jobs
- 9 projects reported $304.5 million estimated capital expenditures
- 133 projects reported 7.7 million estimated commercial square footage
Q1 2023 New Business Announcement Summary:
- 72 announced projects
- 12 projects reported 2,745 new jobs
- 12 projects reported $1.0 billion capital expenditures
- 58 projects reported 5.03 million commercial square footage
FACILITY TYPE
The project announcements during Q1 2024 fell into five categories: distribution warehouse, headquarters, manufacturing, office, and research and development. Not all projects announced a specific type of facility.
INDUSTRY
A third (32 percent) of the announcements in Q1 2024 involved companies engaged in manufacturing. This includes industries such as aviation parts manufacturing to plastics manufacturing. Notable companies included AvAir, Nan Ya Plastics Corp., America, and PolyTex Fibers.
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services, ranked second and accounted for 17 percent of all announcements. This sector primarily comprised companies specializing in technical consulting, engineering, and scientific research & development. Notable companies in this sector that made announcements included Flour Corp., Noble Corp., and ProEnergy Services Inc.
Q1 2024 PARTNERSHIP WINS
The Partnership played a key role in eight of the new business announcements during Q1 2024. The Partnership’s support included services such as a potential site selection, possible incentives for establishing a facility in the area, and market research. These Partnership-supported projects collectively generated more than 1,280 new jobs, attracted more than $304.5 million in capital investment, and represented 3 U.S.-based companies and 5 international companies.
Details on selected Partnership projects:
- CZT Energy is a Thailand-based company specializing in research and development and manufacturing of Solar energy parts and accessories.
- NABOHI is a design, development, and manufacturing company based in Mexico with deep experience in sewage and wastewater treatment and with international clients in Latin America and the Middle East.
- Poggipoini is a company based in Italy that produces fasteners for the aerospace industry is looking to expand to Houston by acquiring a local company.
Methodology
The Partnership Methodology compiles information from a variety of sources for our New Business Announcements (NBAs) database. Methods include but are not limited to, scraping news articles, monitoring Google alerts, and tapping into several databases, such as CoStar. We also include Partnership-assisted projects from our Economic Development Division. Generally, NBAs are projects that meet the qualifying criteria for new and/or expanded corporate real estate facilities, such as having new construction or renovation and meeting one or more of the following criteria: creating 20 or more new jobs, having 5,000 or more square footage, or having an investment of $1 million or more. Retail, educational, government, and other non-commercial facilities do not qualify, but projects creating a headquarters, data center, distribution warehouse, call center, or research and development facility will count.
Prepared by Greater Houston Partnership Research
Margaret Barrientos
Research Analyst
mbarrientos@houston.org
