Savannah Chamber

27 Just a few miles north of Tech Square, Buckhead is developing as a prominent high-tech cluster. For example, Salesforce will expand its presence, creating 600 jobs. GE's first global digital operations center will be in the Prominence office tower, creating 250 jobs. The new GE digital hub will be across the street from the Atlanta Tech Village, a "co-working" space for technology companies. BetterCloud will expand its software development hub at the Piedmont Center, adding 150 jobs over the next two years. The Atlanta MSA's high-tech development is not limited to the City of Atlanta. For example, thyssenkrupp Elevator Americas Business Unit will create more than 650 new jobs in Cobb County at a new headquarters and innovation complex, which is scheduled for completion in 2022. Compared to other large metropolitan areas with strong links to global markets the costs of living and doing business in the Atlanta MSA are low. Companies and nonprofit organizations looking to lower costs will continue to relocate to Atlanta. Access to workers, especially skilled labor, is vital to business success. Despite the limit that traffic congestion places on realistically accessible workers, many companies are attracted to Atlanta due to the large and diverse pool of available workers. The pool of talent is large and deep for occupations that require a college degree as well as for occupations that do not require college degrees. In addition, the high concentration of colleges and universities ensures an abundant supply of experienced faculty, newly minted college graduates, and student interns. Less positively, stricter issuance of H-1B and H4 visas may limit Atlanta's ability to attract international talent. On an annual average basis, the 29-county Atlanta MSA will add 47,100 jobs in 2019, a year-over-year increase of 1.7 percent. Atlanta therefore will account for 68 percent of the state's net job growth – down from 79 percent in 2014. Atlanta's high concentration of service producing industries, IT companies, distribution companies, e-commerce fulfillment centers, institutions of higher education, health care providers, life sciences companies and headquarters operations will keep the job machine in forward gear. Many of the headquarters and other large projects recently announced by the Georgia Department of Economic Development were located in the metropolitan area. Atlanta's outsized information industry will benefit from expanding film and television production as well as surging demand for more sophisticated wireless services and high-volume mobile data applications. Major improvements at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport bode well for Atlanta's growth, especially the new international terminal. The airport is the world's busiest for passenger traffic and is the number one high-tech airport in the nation. It has excellent access to mass transit. Extreme weather events capable of shutting down the airport are relatively rare. The airport makes the Atlanta area an ideal location to operate corporate headquarters due to its large number of direct domestic and international flights. Multi-state and multi-national companies based in Atlanta are flying executives and salespeople everywhere almost every day. Production sites near Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and/or near cold storage facilities appeal to manufacturers of perishable biomedical products (e.g., plasma-based pharmaceuticals) that require cold storage and cold shipping. Lightweight, highly perishable, or time-sensitive products are well suited to air transportation, and therefore many high-tech production companies consider the extensive air cargo facilities at Hartsfield-Jackson to be essential to their operations. The airport also makes Atlanta an excellent hub from which to manage operations or provide business services to a geographically disperse client base. Due to its large meetings and convention industry, Atlanta is the sixth most-visited city by U.S. visitors – behind only Orlando in the South. The metro Atlanta market ranks seventh among U.S. cities in terms of its inventory of hotel rooms. The Georgia Aquarium is Atlanta's most popular attraction. A major expansion of the Georgia Aquarium is in the works, which should boost its popularity even further. The new Mercedes-Benz Stadium will host the Super Bowl in 2019. Atlanta is also a popular destination for international visitors. Cyclical improvements in the national and regional economies will boost Georgia's hospitality industry. Hotel occupancy rates are at or near record levels, but growth in the supply of new rooms will exceed increases in the demand for rooms, reversing the upward trend in occupancy rates that the industry has benefitted from for several years. Airport improvements will help Atlanta to become even more popular as a destination for tourists, persons attending business meetings & conventions, trade shows, as well as sporting/cultural events. New attractions such as Porsche Customer and Driver Experience Center, the Chick-Fil-A College Football Hall of Fame, and the Delta Flight Museum will boost Atlanta's appeal to travelers.

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