New Business Announcements

These announcements represent companies that have either established new operations in the region, relocated company headquarters to the region, or expanded existing Houston-area operations. Some projects started in late ’22 and were not reported to the Partnership until late December ’22 or in the first quarter of ‘23.

PROJECT CATEGORY

The Partnership identified 47 companies that established new operations in Houston between late December ’22 and the end of March ’23, another 23 that expanded operations, and two headquarters relocations: Earthstone Energy, which focuses on oil and gas, and PackGene, which focuses on biotechnology. 

To qualify as a “new business announcement,” the project must disclose at least one of the following values: number of created jobs, amount of capital invested, and/or footage of office or industrial space leased. Only a small portion of the new business announcements disclose more than one of these values, however. As a result, the Partnership’s analysis of capital investment, employment, and square footage represent a low-ball estimate for new business activity.

YEAR-OVER-YEAR

Q1/23 logged 72 announcements, a 111 percent increase over Q1/22 when 34 projects were announced. Of the 72, 12 provided information on new jobs, 12 on the capital investment, which totaled $1.02 billion, and 58 on space occupied, which was 5.0 million or more square feet of industrial and office space.
Q1 ’23 New Business Announcements Summary:

• 72 announced projects
• 12 projects reported 2,745 new jobs
• 12 projects reported $1.0 billion estimated capital expenditures
• 58 projects reported 5 million estimated commercial square footage

Q1 ’22 New Business Announcement Summary:

• 34 announced projects
• Seven projects reported 1,535 new jobs
• Six projects reported $673 million capital expenditures
• 29 projects reported 3.13 million commercial square footage

ANNOUNCEMENTS BY FACILITY TYPE

The project announcements in Q1 ‘23 fall into four categories: manufacturing, office, warehouse, and headquarters. 

ANNOUNCEMENTS BY INDUSTRY

Over a third (35 percent) of the announcements involved companies engages in manufacturing. This included companies in aerospace, air conditioning, building materials and solar panels. 

Professional, scientific and technical services accounted for 15 percent of all new project announcements. 

Transportation, warehousing and wholesale trade accounted for another 14 percent.

PARTNERSHIP WINS

The Partnership played a key role in nine of the new business announcements in Q1/23. The Partnership’s support included services such as a potential location selection, possible incentives for establishing a facility in the area, and market research. These nine Partnership supported projects collectively generated more than 1,700 new jobs, attracted more than $650 million in capital investment, and represented 2 U.S.-based companies and 7 international companies.
 

Details on selected Partnership projects:

• ACE Green Recycling, a battery recycling company, is building a battery recycling plant near Houston. With a capital investment of $150 million, the project is expected to generate 100 jobs.
• Carbon Clean, a British business that develops carbon capture solutions for difficult-to-abate industries including cement, steel, and refineries, is launching an office in Houston, with plans for future expansion. With an undetermined financial expenditure, the initial office will provide two jobs.
• Daikin Comfort Technologies, a Japanese HVAC manufacturer, is expanding its Houston presence with a new product line for their most recent digital HVAC technology. The expansion will amount to $40 million and create 200 new jobs.
• Hicri Ercili, a Turkish chemical company is establishing a sales and distribution office in Houston with plans for further expansion of a chemical manufacturing plant in the near future. With a $2.7 million capital expenditure, the first office will create 18 jobs.
• SEG Solar, a solar panel manufacturer, is establishing a panel production facility in the Houston area. With a capital expenditure of $35 million, the project is expected to create 500 jobs.
• Sumika Semiconductor Materials Texas Inc, a Sumitomo Chemical subsidiary, is constructing a high-purity semiconductor process chemical manufacturing facility in the Houston area. The project will cost $250 million and will create 50 jobs in the region.

Methodology

Our methodology involves compiling information from a variety of sources to create our New Business Announcements (NBAs) database. Methods include, but are not limited to, scraping headlines, monitoring alerts, and tapping into several databases. 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 20,000 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