Fort Worth nonprofit says it’s brought billions in business to Cowtown
In its two-year existence, a Fort Worth nonprofit has already brought almost $10 billion in investments and thousands of new jobs to the area, the group’s leaders said Wednesday.
Created in 2023, the Fort Worth Economic Development Partnership has brought 11,000 new jobs and $9.7 billion of capital investments to the nation’s 11th largest city, president and CEO Robert Allen said.
Allen unveiled the figures at the partnership’s inaugural annual meeting Wednesday night at the Amon G. Carter Museum.
“Simply put, at the Fort Worth EDP, we’re turning ‘what if’ into ‘what’s next,’” Allen said, citing three multi-million dollar ventures brought to the area since the creation of the partnership.
German electronics company Siemens announced in 2023 that it would build a $190 million tech hub in the city. That manufacturing plant, which focuses on the production of low-voltage switchboards and switchgear, opened earlier this year.
By 2026, the plant will employ 715 people, the Star-Telegram previously reported.
In 2024, Fort Worth-based Bell Textron announced that it had chosen a Fort Worth site as the location of a new helicopter manufacturing plant.
That plant, worth over $630 million, makes parts for Bell’s V-280 Valor aircraft, chosen by the U.S. Army in 2022 to replace the Black Hawk helicopter as its long-range assault aircraft.
City incentives require the plant to create at least 520 new jobs by the end of 2039, the Star-Telegram previously reported.
The third venture, Allen said, is that Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Wistron will build two new facilities in far north Fort Worth, generating over $700 million in capital investment and almost 900 new jobs.
For James Litinsky, the CEO of Las Vegas-based MP Materials, Fort Worth is key to the future of his company.
MP Materials operates the only rare-earth mineral mine in the United States and the raw materials that come from that mine make high-powered magnets key to developments in electric vehicles and physical AI, Litinsky said.
The company’s Fort Worth facility will be “significantly expanded” as part of a $500 million magnet-recycling deal with Apple.
With AI on the rise, Litinsky said, the facility positions Fort Worth to become a “center for excellence” in new technology.
“The founders of this city dug the deep wells of innovation and progress we still draw from today,” Allen said in his remarks. “They transformed a small town on the edge of the prairie into a global destination-and it’s on us to keep that spirit alive and push it forward.”
