The tech HQ magnet that is Austin just attracted yet another new arrival.
Markaaz Inc., which makes an artificial intelligence-powered small business platform that helps connect those kinds of companies to clients and services, has relocated its headquarters to Austin from Los Angeles, the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce's Opportunity Austin group announced April 8.
The startup, which has raised $8 million in funding since its launch in 2019, in March picked the Foundry I building at 310 Comal St. for its new office. It plans to hire 70 people by the end of the year, and it's aiming to have a team of 150 by the end of 2022.
The announcement came a few months after it landed a strategic relationship with the BDO Alliance, which is a group of accounting, consulting and service firms focused on small and mid-sized businesses. Markaaz has also worked with the likes of Salesforce and Equifax.
As has been the case with dozens of companies relocating to Austin, Markaaz cited Austin's talent pool as a prime driver of its move. But it also leaned into Austin's softer side.
"Our core value of 'do good' — which emphasizes people who care about their impact on the world, the environment, society, the economy and the communities we live in — aligned with the heart and soul of the Austin community," founder and CEO Hany Fam said in a statement.
Markaaz adds to a list of at least 18 companies that have relocated their headquarters to metro Austin in recent months. About a week ago, Portland-based e-commerce startup City Shoppe announced it's moving to Austin. And at the end of March, XR Masters, which develops software that enables virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality, relocated its headquarters to Austin from Chicago. A day before that news broke, Elevate Brands said Austin would be the its second headquarters, and that CEO Ryan Gnesin and many of its other top execs had relocated here.
It's unclear how many employees Markaaz currently has, or whether it plans to keep a presence in L.A. Representatives for the company couldn't immediately be reached for comment. According to information provided by Markaaz on LinkedIn, the company has at least 16 employees.
The new jobs the company is planning to hire for comes as the city's tech sector continues to boom even through a pandemic that has strained other parts of the economy. Austin saw 6,202 tech job openings in March, an increase of more than 1,400 from the month prior, according to a recent report by the Computing Technology Industry Association — the fourth-largest month-over-month jump in the nation.
