In 2021, employers publicly committed to hiring at least 570 technology workers in southeast Wisconsin, according to an annual impact report from the MKE Tech Hub Coalition.
Formed in 2019, the coalition's goal is to inclusively double the region's technology talent, including employees working in technology roles for companies across industries, as well as non-technical employees working for companies in the tech industry.
There were more than 80,000 tech workers in the Milwaukee, Racine and Kenosha metropolitan statistical areas in 2020, according to the report, which uses prior-year data from the information technology (IT) industry group CompTIA Inc.
In 2019, there were around 81,000 tech workers in the region. The slight decrease in 2020 was attributable to the pandemic, MKE Tech Hub Coalition CEO Kathy Henrich said.
The 2021 number will be published this spring. The group is "hopeful, based on what we've seen so far" that the count will be up, Henrich said.
However, the increase in remote work has complicated the data.
"Nobody knows how to count right now this virtual worker trend," Henrich said. "People that are living here, working for other companies ... they are not included in that and there's not yet a good data pool that would allow us to completely understand that."
Among the employers that committed tech jobs to the region in 2021 were New York IT services firm Genesis10, which has a software development training program in Milwaukee called Dev10. In January 2021 it said it would add at least 150 employees in its Milwaukee/Madison market.
ManpowerGroup's Experis Game Solutions plans to add more than 100 jobs in its quality assurance division as part of a new esports and IT workforce development program created by the MKESports Alliance and New Horizons of Wisconsin.
Fiserv Inc. plans to add 50 local jobs through the Outsource to Milwaukee program of New Jersey-based software and IT firm GalaxE.Solutions Inc.
The coalition's strategies for doubling the region's tech talent pool include developing a pipeline of diverse, local talent, improving the area's startup ecosystem, and attracting talent and companies from outside southeast Wisconsin.
"Doubling tech talent is a longer-term goal," Henrich said. "It's going to take some time to get there."
No. of tech workers in southeast Wisconsin
- 2020: 80,440
- 2019: 80,925
- 2018: 78,553
- 2017: 77,677
Source: MKE Tech Hub Coalition / CompTIA
