Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by Manpower.
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For the week of February 6, 2026, here’s what we’re reading:
Redefine the future of medicine: Build your career in cell and gene therapy
San Diego is fast becoming a global launchpad for cell and gene therapy breakthroughs—and the companies behind these innovations are hiring. Discover how this fast‑growing sector is reshaping modern medicine and why top scientists and engineers are building their careers here in San Diego.
In February 2026, with Mayor Todd Gloria and underwriters Booz Allen Hamilton, JPMorganChase, and Qualcomm, World Trade Center San Diego (WTCSD) and San Diego and Imperial SBDC Network unveiled the eighth cohort of 15 companies selected to participate in MetroConnect, the region’s comprehensive international sales accelerator.
Since the program’s debut in 2015, 110 MetroConnect alumni have collectively added 357 new jobs to the region, signed more than 552 new contracts, and set up 28 new overseas facilities. Cohort companies grow their exports by an average of 66 percent and revenues by 45 percent as part of the program.
Alumni include Novo Brazil Brewing Co., Access Trax, Aquacycl, White Labs, Dr. Bronner’s, Scientist.com, Cloudbeds, Cypher Genomics (acquired by Human Longevity Inc.), and many more.
The MetroConnect program is highly competitive, with just 15 companies selected based on a variety of criteria, including interest in new foreign markets, assessed impact of funds, current international traction and more. Applicants were assessed by a panel of senior level representatives from Biocom, Booz Allen, JPMorganChase, SDSU’s Wendy Gillespie Center for Advancing Global Business, U.S. Commercial Service, and WTCSD.
“Since 2015, the City of San Diego has partnered with MetroConnect to help local companies compete and succeed in the global economy,” said San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria. “Programs like this connect San Diego businesses to new markets, support job creation here at home, and strengthen the innovation economy that powers our region. We’re committed to backing homegrown companies as they scale, export, and take San Diego’s ideas to the world.”
Why go global?
Amid economic uncertainty, it is more important than ever to help local SMEs build resilience by facilitating increased sales in global markets.
In 2024 alone, San Diego exported $34.5 billion in goods overseas, as well as billions more in services like software, cybersecurity, engineering and research. SMEs produce 92 percent of those goods—driving home the importance of programs like MetroConnect.
“JPMorganChase is proud to support San Diego businesses and their global growth,” said Aaron Ryan, San Diego Region Manager, JPMorganChase. “MetroConnect has a strong track record of helping local companies drive increased revenue through effective export strategies, making them more competitive, efficient, and successful here at home. We’re proud to continue our commitment to supporting San Diego’s business community.”
Next up for MetroConnect VIII
The cohort will gain access to a suite of resources to support expansion into international markets, including executive workshops, mentorship and complimentary consulting from multinational corporations, and up to $30,000 in grant funding.
“The next few years present a key opportunity for San Diego businesses looking to build resilience in a shifting economic and trade landscape,” said Nikia Clarke, executive director of WTCSD. “The MetroConnect program remains a dedicated partner to these businesses, equipping San Diego’s growing firms to compete in global markets, help our region’s innovation change lives around the world, and create quality jobs here at home.”
WTCSD and San Diego and Imperial SBDC Network unveiled the new cohort at a community event at BCG San Diego. WTCSD is the Export Specialty SBDC for San Diego and Imperial Valley and works to cultivate a regional pipeline of export-ready firms.
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by Manpower.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of January 30, 2026, here’s what we’re reading:
Apply by Feb. 13: Host a fully funded intern (or two)!
Interested in strengthening your company’s talent pipeline? San Diego companies with fewer than 100 employees may apply to host up to two paid interns at no cost! Join the 300+ local companies that have collectively saved more than $4.3 million in payroll through Advancing San Diego.
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by Manpower.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of January 23, 2026, here’s what we’re reading:
Join us as we unveil the 15 San Diego companies selected to join MetroConnect, World Trade Center San Diego’s international sales accelerator. You’ll have the chance to connect with 100+ international business leaders, including key partners like EXIM Bank, U.S. Commercial Service, and international trade offices—and enter for the chance to win two round-trip tickets to anywhere in South America via Copa Airlines!
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by Manpower.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of January 16, 2026, here’s what we’re reading:
2025 saw a complex economic landscape driven by uncertainty. In 2026, San Diego stands at an inflection point—one where technological transformation collides with traditional economic challenges in ways we haven’t seen before. EDC’s Vice President of Economic Development & Research Eduardo Velasquez shares the economic trends we’re watching in 2026.
As another year begins, I sit with my crystal ball once again to see what we can glean from the data we’ve received this past year and what implications it may have for our region’s economic growth in the year ahead.
The past year told a complex story, driven by uncertainty. On the surface, the U.S. economy performed remarkably well, achieving 4.3 percent real GDP growth in Q3 2025, representing an acceleration from a year ago. But this growth has been buoyed by unprecedented investment in AI led by a handful of companies, potentially masking deeper structural shifts beneath the surface.
The U.S. achieved this growth while creating just 584,000 jobs—roughly one-third the rate seen in the past decade. And while San Diego gained its fair share, adding 5,800 jobs through November 2025, all our job growth was principally concentrated in higher education, healthcare, and local government.
In 2026, San Diego stands at an inflection point—one where technological transformation collides with traditional economic challenges in ways we haven’t seen before.
Innovation industries are losing steam
Our region’s innovation engines—the traded clusters that have long defined San Diego’s competitive advantage—are sputtering. Cumulative job growth across aerospace, life sciences, tech, and manufacturing has plateaued or declined from pandemic-era peaks. Cleantech continues to add jobs, though it represents a smaller sliver and is also growing at a slower pace than in previous years. More concerning, it’s not just leaner firms we’re seeing, but fewer firms altogether. Firm growth across these key industries has stagnated, with only defense tech startups providing a bright spot in an otherwise sobering picture.
This matters because innovation industry jobs have an outsized impact on our economy, with each added job supporting another two jobs elsewhere in the economy. When these jobs contract, the ripple effects are significant.
So what’s going on? In part, it’s a tale of structural transformation. Professional, scientific, and technical service jobs, which our innovation cluster relies on, declined 3.3 percent through November 2025. Meanwhile, an additional 550,000 square feet of office space were vacated during the year, bringing total vacant space to 11.3 million square feet in a year with zero new construction. 2025 showed our region’s economy is increasingly dependent on fewer knowledge workers and thus less office space to host those workers.
Yet, investment is happening. Nationwide, construction spending toward data centers is set to eclipse that of traditional office buildings—a trend that accelerated dramatically after ChatGPT’s release. Infrastructure investments are building for servers, not people.
AI is picking up the slack, for now
Amid this disruption comes a silver lining—AI may be delivering what all new technologies promise: Productivity. Looking at inflation-adjusted average wages as a proxy for productivity growth, San Diego’s innovation industries have recovered from the pandemic. AI may be responsible for this recovery, enabling workers to do more with less. This could help explain the decline in local job postings, which fell six percent in 2025.
The question is whether this productivity boost translates into broader prosperity or simply allows companies to operate with smaller teams.
San Diego’s talent landscape reflects this uncertainty. While the value of a degree has been questioned more than perhaps any time in history, it still brings higher income and greater job security in our region. In the past decade, more than twice as many local jobs have been added that require a bachelor’s degree or higher than those requiring associate’s degrees or less. This trend accelerated in 2025, with jobs requiring bachelor’s degrees or higher outnumbering others by a factor of six.
Yet, new graduates are struggling in a job market that increasingly favors experience alongside credentials. The national unemployment rate for young college graduates stands at 4.8 percent, up more than a percentage point compared to before the pandemic.
The market signal is clear: Disruption continues to favor those with degrees and experience, even as the nature of work itself transforms.
Affordability is not a hoax; it’s an enigma
Incomes are up and people are spending their money, but they’re not happy about it. That’s because the essentials like housing, childcare, energy, and transportation continue to get more expensive—local energy prices, for instance, are up nine percent year-over-year as of November 2025.
Housing affordability remains the single biggest threat to regional prosperity. While San Diego’s median household income has increased 25 percent since 2020—a welcome development—the cost of homeownership has far outpaced these gains. The median-priced home fell slightly to $990,000 in Q3 2025, requiring a household income of $263,000 to afford the monthly mortgage payment. Even those looking to rent are facing an average monthly outlay of $2,900, which makes San Diego one of the most expensive counties to rent in the nation.
There’s a glimmer of hope: San Diego home sales increased 14 percent year-over-year in September 2025, suggesting some movement in a frozen market.
Yet meaningful housing market recovery will remain elusive until mortgage rates drop substantially enough to free homeowners locked into historically low rates or make room for significant new supply.
The year ahead
These trends—the pace and composition of job growth, AI’s impact in the demand for talent, and housing affordability—will define San Diego’s 2026.
Can we leverage regional strengths to capture new growth opportunities, particularly in defense tech where startups show momentum? Will hiring priorities shift to tap new pools of talent as employers rethink what it means to be a skilled worker? How do we make room for more housing in a region where working families are increasingly priced out, while the office is increasingly empty?
The answers aren’t in my crystal ball.
They require deliberate action through an intentional, inclusive economic development agenda. We must make sure our region—and our state—is a place that not only cultivates great ideas but also enables the realization of those ideas into solutions, products, and jobs. We must make it easier for builders to build infrastructure and easier for businesses to do business.
In 2026, EDC will work to position San Diego as the destination for defense tech investment, build pipelines to better address employers’ evolving talent needs, and identify opportunities to replace unused office with much needed housing and infrastructure for working families.
But we can only do this with and through you—our partners across industry and academia, local and state government.
Now more than ever, our goal remains constant: To maximize San Diego’s economic prosperity and global competitiveness through meaningful partnerships with our 150+ investors and regional stakeholders. We know where we are and where we need to go. Getting there in 2026 will require resolve, creativity, and bold action—together.
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by Manpower.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of January 9, 2026, here’s what we’re reading:
Rain or shine, Good News of the Week hits your inbox every Friday, offering a fresh dose of positivity as you end your week. We’ve compiled 2025’s top stories in Good News of the Year—and look forward to creating and curating more good news with you in 2026.
Despite the challenges making headlines throughout 2025, Good News of the Week hit your inbox every Friday morning, offering a fresh dose of positivity as you turned the page on yet another week. As we share this year’s top stories in Good News of the Year, we hope you will enjoy this positive look back at 2025, and we look forward to creating and curating more good news with you in 2026.
See what San Diego accomplished in Good News of the Year:
New neighbors and local upgrades
As San Diego became home for many notable companies, reflecting our global reputation in life sciences, tech, and tourism, we also cut the ribbon on highly-anticipated upgrades to the region. Some highlights:
San Diego continued to bring in the deals, partnerships, and acquisitions that forged meaningful collaboration—a testament to both the people who live and work here, as well as growing appetites for our innovative companies, programs, and ideas. Among this year’s high-impact partnerships, these topped our list:
Ranked as a top city for innovation, San Diego’s high profile reflects our region’s diverse skillset and expertise. This year’s top venture funds and IPOs showed continued demand for homegrown tech, life sciences, cybersecurity, and defense technologies:
Carlsbad-based spine surgery medtech Carlsmed files $100M IPO
Cybereason raises $120M for cyber attack protection
From classrooms to careers
San Diego’s education systems remained strong, focusing on continued innovation and increasing access between two-year and four-year institutions, as well as industry. See our region’s resilience in education:
San Diego companies remained at the forefront of innovation, making breakthroughs in cancer therapies, medical testing, and AI integration—and advancing our region’s competitiveness on a global scale. Key milestones included:
In 2025, San Diego continued creating the products, research, and ideas that make a global impact across all time zones. We dare you to find a place San Diego innovation hasn’t touched; see our region’s reach for yourself:
General Atomics completes novel fusion energy magnet for ITER project in France
Contributing an estimated $61.3 billion in annual regional economic impact, San Diego’s military presence in 2025 reinforced what we know is true: The cluster fuels not only our economy, but defense innovation on a larger scale.
Named among eight A-rated cities in the US for climate action, San Diego’s companies and organizations remained uniquely positioned to drive green decision-making and inspire collaboration locally and across the border. The region’s impact:
The chants we heard from the crowd at Snapdragon Stadium as we welcomed our region’s MLS team created a refreshed wave of pride, resulting in a season of wins that transcended languages and touched hearts across our binational region. See what we rooted for:
This year, EDC celebrated our 60th anniversary of building an inclusive economy and driving forward our region’s most impactful industries, talent, and employers with and through you. Our favorite EDC moments:
EDC celebrates 60th anniversary, welcomes Padres’ Tom Seidler as board chair
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by ACE Parking.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of December 12, 2025, here’s what we’re reading:
As EDC’s international affiliate and the region’s Export Specialty SBDC, World Trade Center San Diego (WTCSD) expanded San Diego’s global reach by cultivating export-ready firms and international investment. This year, WTCSD released its Binational Trade and Competitiveness report, grew regional exports by $10 million, executed France trade mission, supported 89 companies through hands-on export advising and programming, and much more.
Every week, ‘Good News of the Week’ features a curation of positive headlines from San Diego, delivered straight to your inbox. A blend of aggregated stories from San Diego’s most trusted news sources and original EDC-created content, GNOTW provides a comprehensive recap of the region’s best stories from the past week. GNOTW is sponsored by ACE Parking.
Get Good News of the Week in your inbox every Friday.→ Sign up
For the week of December 5, 2025, here’s what we’re reading:
As we head into 2026, there are many important and valuable causes, initiatives, and organizations within our region that are in need—among them youth employment and internship programs. EDC’s Advancing San Diego program has funded paid work-based learning experiences for more than 800 students to date and is in need of support for its next cohort—whether contributing financially or hosting an intern.
