Ashley Gossen, Chief Economic Development Officer, greater:SATX Regional Economic Partnership

In an interview with Invest:, Ashley Gossen, chief economic development officer for greater:SATX Regional Economic Partnership, discussed the workforce and economic development organization’s efforts to attract job-producing investments and foster regional collaboration. “Our story is much stronger when it’s a unified message, and we’re leveraging each other and our various regional assets,” said Gossen.

What makes Greater San Antonio an ideal location for businesses to establish or relocate?

The Greater San Antonio region, which is the San Antonio-New Braunfels MSA, is an eight-county region with a population of about 2.7 million people. What I think is so unique about the Greater San Antonio region is that it is one of the foundational pieces of Texas. It is a place that is a core building block to the industries and assets that we have in Texas today.

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How are you leveraging recent investments by businesses to attract further investment in the region?

Our organization is focused on attracting job-producing investments. That means targeting companies and projects that bring new capital into the community and create jobs of choice — jobs with opportunities for progression, comprehensive benefits, competitive wages, and training opportunities.

We leverage investments from companies like JCB and Toyota as proof that manufacturing works here. JCB and Toyota, with their 20-year presence in San Antonio and recent expansion, demonstrate this success. 

At the end of the day, a company’s success here is about our workforce. With 170,000 students enrolled in programs across the region, they are learning advanced manufacturing, attending top business schools, or entering healthcare. We want that talent to stay here. Companies are looking for places where that talent exists. San Antonio’s biggest opportunity to leverage momentum lies in its workforce.

Over the last five years, our educational attainment rate rose by more than six percentage points, the fastest rate among competitive metros. Programs like SA Ready to Work help our talent stay in the workforce, upskill, and move into higher roles, which in turn helps future generations backfill those roles. Investing in the workforce is the most important thing any community can do.

Can you expand on your specific workforce development programs and the partnerships with educational institutions, training centers, and industry leaders?

We take a leadership role in convening all the regional university presidents. This is significant because it brings together university leaders to collaborate and identify opportunities to align curriculum and programs to industry demand.

Programmatically, at greater:SATX, we have a summer internship program that brings high-school students into various regional employers during their summer break. This internship provides experiences beyond the classroom.

We also support Texas FAME, a division of the U.S. Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education. This program fast-tracks individuals into manufacturing roles and has been so successful that it has expanded, with other regions like Seguin and New Braunfels launching their own Texas FAME programs. This mix of training programs creates a diverse and robust talent pipeline for the region.

Along with cybersecurity, military, and manufacturing, what specific sectors are you targeting for growth or to further integrate San Antonio into those ecosystems?

We continue targeting cybersecurity and IT where we have significant assets and opportunities to win new investments. San Antonio hosts Air Force Cyber and the most trained cybersecurity professionals outside of our nation’s capital region. Financial and professional services remain critical, with USAA, Frost, and others headquartered here. Guidehouse’s decision to create 1,000 jobs here, Texas’ largest office expansion in 2024, highlights the region’s talent advantage.

Aerospace thrives at Port San Antonio with Boeing, StandardAero, Knight Aerospace, and Plus One Robotics. Proximity to Joint Base San Antonio strengthens this sector. Advanced manufacturing is a core strength, and within it, automotive is also key, with Toyota’s manufacturing operations, Tesla’s headquarters nearby, and a dense corridor of OEMs. 

Life sciences is a priority, with UT Health and UTSA (both now R1 Carnegie designated), and Texas Biomed leading infectious disease research. The sector attracts major health and biotech investments.

Corporate headquarters remain a focus across industries, emphasizing administration, sales, marketing, accounting, finance, and legal services. These core industries will continue driving San Antonio’s economy.

How does greater:SATX engage with local governments, counties, and cities to create a more favorable business environment in San Antonio? 

Businesses focus on sites, taxes, and drive times, not political borders. Economic development organizations and community leaders can facilitate that cross-jurisdiction collaboration. In 2021, our organization became a regional organization, serving not only San Antonio but Bexar and the surrounding seven counties, which include Seguin, Medina County, Kendall County, New Braunfels, Schertz, Converse, and Floresville. Today, we have 14 regional partners, including the city of San Antonio and Bexar County.

We work with these partners in several ways. First, we market the region, using a unified message to strengthen our story and leverage assets. Second, we work on projects, pooling resources to help partners navigate them efficiently. When a project is narrowed to a site, we save time by focusing on it rather than exploring multiple locations. Our role is to help companies see all options and assist jurisdictions in closing deals.

What is your outlook for the Greater San Antonio region, and what are the partnership’s top priorities for the next two to three years?

2024 was our best year since the pandemic, and that momentum is expected to continue. The region secured $1.7 billion in capital expenditures that will create 5,000 new jobs, with further growth anticipated.

Last year, San Antonio attracted its largest office project to date — Guidehouse, a global consulting firm, selected the city for its regional hub, creating 1,000 new jobs.

Since 2021, when the economic development strategic plan began, the San Antonio–New Braunfels MSA has secured roughly 17,000 new jobs and $6.6 billion in capital investment.

The momentum continues to grow, with strong interest from businesses expanding across the United States and foreign direct investment from the global community. San Antonio remains one of the fastest-growing regions in the country, reflecting its appeal to people and businesses. The region is welcoming, pro-business, and offers the support needed to quickly get facilities up and running.

San Antonio’s time is now, and the next five years are expected to be monumental. To support that, we are in the process of drafting our next five-year regional economic development plan. This plan will take us through to 2030 and will build on the momentum of the current five-year plan.