Amazon made a major announcement today that involves plans to expand its tech hubs across the U.S, creating 3,500 new jobs in the process. That includes its existing tech hub at the Galleria Towers in North Dallas.

The Seattle-headquartered tech giant plans to grow by more than 100,000 square feet of space at the Dallas Tech Hub in the Galleria. It also expects to create 600 new tech and corporate roles there, including cloud infrastructure architects, software engineers, data scientists, product managers, and UX designers.

Dallas is one of six cities in the U.S. included in the expansion. In total, Amazon is bringing 3,500 jobs to Dallas, Detroit, Denver, Manhattan, Phoenix, and San Diego to support businesses across Amazon such as AWS, Alexa, Amazon Advertising, Amazon Fashion, OpsTech, and Amazon Fresh.

According to the company, these plans represent an investment of more than $1.4 billion, which adds to the more than $350 billion invested and the 602,000 new jobs created nationwide over the past decade.

It’s all part of a move to “continue creating in communities across the U.S.” And, grow these communities’ emerging tech workforces.

“People from all walks of life come to Amazon to develop their careers–from recent graduates looking for a place to turn their ideas into high-impact products, to veterans accessing new jobs in cloud computing thanks to our upskilling programs,” Beth Galetti, senior vice president of human resources at Amazon, said in a statement. “These 3,500 new jobs will be in cities across the country with strong and diverse talent pools.”

Amazon has a storied history with Dallas and Texas as a whole.

Across the state, Amazon employs 43,000 workers and has invested more than $16 billion. In Dallas, Amazon has around 19,000 employees and 13 fulfillment centers. It is also the largest industrial building tenant in the region.

Dallas was also one of 20 finalists for Amazon’s HQ2 decision that had city leaders across the country on the edges of their seats for the majority of 2018.

Amazon made two official visits to Dallas-Fort Worth, and the unified front presented in the region’s overall response to the largest RFP in Dallas-Fort Worth history was noticed.

Dallas “checked all the boxes” for what Amazon was looking for and was a finalist in the search. In the end, Amazon chose Crystal City, Virginia, after an initial announcement in November 2018 to split its second headquarters between Crystal City and Long Island, New York.

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Even after the decision, Amazon has continued to ramp up its presence in the region, especially throughout COVID-19. It recently chose Las Colinas as the first location for its new Neighborhood Health Center pilot program and opened an 855,000-square-foot fulfillment center in Oak Cliff, the first to open in the state during the pandemic.

As TechCrunch notes, Amazon’s latest announcement is notable during a time when most industries have frozen hiring. “Amazon has found continued success” during the pandemic, the pub notes, with its e-commerce platform proving essential.

Amazon estimates that its direct investments have contributed $315 billion to the country’s economy over the past 10 years. It has more than 876,000 employees worldwide, according to the company, and offers a range of skills training programs to prepare people for new, in-demand jobs.

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