AUSTIN-Thirty Austin business people are traveling to Boston this week to shore up Austin's job base and try to attract more jobs to Central Texas. The trip comes just over two months after a similar journey to the Silicon Valley.
The Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce has organized both trips, which have drawn participants from a range of businesses including real estate, technology and banking as well as university officials and economic development officers from surrounding cities.The economic slump has pushed the city's unemployment rate to 5.2% in March, up from 2.7% in March 2001. With about 24,000 layoffs since January 2001, the number of unemployed workers had doubled to 40,086 in March from 20,010 a year earlier. The city's overall office vacancy rate–including direct and sublease space–has risen to nearly 22%.
Those kinds of figures and their impact on the Central Texas economy have pushed the chamber to reinstate economic development trips after a five-year hiatus. In recent years, the chamber and others in the area tried to cope with digesting its explosive growth.
In Boston, the delegation's mission will be much the same as it was in California as it visits 30 to 40 companies. First, it will visit Boston-based companies with Austin operations to thank them and let them know is ready for more business. “The main purpose is to make sure our tech companies stay and expand in Central Texas,” said John Breier, the chamber's vice president of economic development.
The group also will check in with companies involved in semiconductors, software, biotechnology, computers and their peripheral equipment, digital entertainment and technology commercialization. Part of those visits will be to encourage Boston companies to expand to Austin, especially those in bioinformatics and nanotechnology.
After the California trip the chamber said six companies expressed strong interest in expanding Austin operations. So far, however, none have announced anything.
Angelos Angelou, head of Angelou Economic Advisors in Austin, says the area could use a new employer to bring a lot of jobs to town. It would bring positive attention to Austin and energize the area.
Real estate-related firms sending representatives to Boston are Bury + Partners, Turner Collie & Braden Inc., Carter Burgess, Heritage Title Co., JB Goodwin, Henry S. Miller Commercial, Crescent Real Estate Equities Ltd. and CB Richard Ellis Inc.
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