Facebook’s parent company Meta recently leased a large office space in Texas, making the tech giant the latest company to move jobs and people from California to the Lone Star State.
Meta leased half of a building under construction in downtown Austin that will be the city’s tallest skyscraper when completed and has pledged hundreds of new jobs in Texas, the Austin Business Journal reported Friday.
“We first came to Austin over 10 years ago with just seven employees, now over 2,000 of us are proud to call Austin home,” Katherine Shappley, the head of Meta’s Austin office, said in a statement. “We’re committed to Austin and look forward to growing here together.”
Meta, which is headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, is expected to hire approximately 400 people in the Austin area and will have the ability and space to hire many more in the region, the company said.
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Tech executives and workers have fled Silicon Valley over the course of the pandemic, lured to red states by a lower cost of living, the possibility of remote work, and low taxes.
As a result, Northern California has suffered a “brain drain” to states such as Texas, Florida, Colorado, and Utah.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced late last year that he would be moving his company headquarters out of Silicon Valley to Austin, criticizing “politicians and unelected bureaucrats” in California who he said have abused their powers during the pandemic.
Samsung also announced a new chip factory in Texas last November, while Oracle moved its headquarters from Silicon Valley to Austin earlier in 2020.
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Some red states, including Texas and Florida, have experienced a combined 35% increase in tech employees coming to their states in the past year rather than traditional tech hubs, such as California, New York, or Washington, according to reports.
