Dallas is continuing its streak of relocations from California.

Notable recently was Charles Schwab purchasing TD Ameritrade and deciding to move the combined corporation to North Texas. That followed the news that McKesson was relocating to Irving from San Francisco.

Earlier this year, it was reported via the latest U.S. migration count that the number of Californians moving to Texas had grown by more than a third. And, the net gain of out-of-state residents rose by about 78 percent in 2018.

Of the largest metros, Dallas-Fort Worth attracted the largest number of out-of-state movers, according to the DMN. That translated to 200,966 new residents.

But more fitting research—especially with the news that Blue Box Air is headed to Deep Ellum from California—is the fact that tech firms are moving, and being started, in the region all of the time. It’s become a tech migration.

Since January 2010, 58 out of 89 Bay Area-headquartered tech and life science companies have taken more than 30 million square feet of office space throughout the U.S. About 1 million square feet of that was in Dallas-Fort Worth.

Sixteen of these companies have set up shop in the region—including Google, Facebook, Juul, Lyft, Oracle, Palo Alto, Salesforce, Tesla and Uber. “It’s all part of a larger trend,” Cushman & Wakefield says, “as Dallas’ tech sector continues to grow—it now represents 5.8 percent of total employment and accounts for 6.9 percent of Dallas office space.”

Add to that Blue Box’s new headquarters at 3927 Main Street in Deep Ellum, which is currently being built out.

Blue Box is behind a patented process for cleaning the coils in HVAC systems. Its solution reduces energy consumption, costs, and CO2, all intended to improve air quality and facility health. Last week, we told you about a timely new disinfection protocol from Blue Box that could combat COVID-19 infiltrating commercial HVAC systems.

“Blue Box is at the forefront of revolutionizing how companies think about the carbon footprint and the quality of their indoor air,” CEO Jim Metropoulos says. “On this end, we are combining our innovation of how to clean and disinfect a building’s HVAC as a new approach to how companies can greatly reduce their building’s energy consumption and indoor air quality that both reduces their carbon footprint while reducing their operating costs.”

Metropoulos, who plans to move his team here this week, attributed several factors to the relocation.

Blue Box is growing at a very rapid pace. Metropoulos is currently working to expand the management team and administration, so the cost of living in Dallas offered an attractive proposition for employees.

“Dallas is a gorgeous city and the people are great—in the end, it was a pretty easy decision,” he says. “From a business perspective, I would say the tax-friendly nature of Texas was a big part of our decision process.”

Texas is one of Blue Box’s biggest markets, with technology, operations, and clients already in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and South Texas. Blue Box services clients nationwide, so Dallas’ location in the center of the country will greatly improve the team’s travel abilities and opportunities to meet with clients.

Blue Box will be relocating five employees immediately, and expects to hire 30-50 more within the next 12 months.

“The lower cost of living, taxes, and the lower cost of real estate will greatly facilitate our growth as a new company,” Metropoulos says. “North Texas also provides Blue Box with a very rich market for our services in optimizing buildings’ energy efficiency with many of the country’s leading businesses now relocating their HQ’s to North Texas.”

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