Growth & Diversification Plan

executive summary

Region 4 will retain its four priority clusters – Advanced Manufacturing, Information Technology, Logistics and Bioscience. The Council has endorsed adding Energy as a fifth cluster. The addition will reinforce economic growth, further enable existing clusters, and organize innovation, capital, and partnerships around a critical growth input.

• The Chmura data indicate that GO Virginia Region 4 continues to build momentum in its efforts to drive innovation, expand high-wage employment opportunities, and support strategic cluster growth. Since the last reporting period (2022 to 2024), the region has fully recovered from the pandemic-era economic contraction and is now surpassing pre-2020 employment levels. Employment across the four target clusters—Logistics, Warehousing, and Distribution; Biosciences/Life Sciences; Information Technology and Communication; and Manufacturing—has grown overall, with strong wage gains and major new project announcements poised to further accelerate diversification.
• The Logistics, Warehousing and Distribution cluster led in employment growth, up 16.3% between 2022-2024. Information Technology had the highest wage growth, growing to $89,037 annually. The Bioscience cluster also showed promising growth with traded sectors like pharmaceutical manufacturing and medical R&D providing an opportunity for continued export-oriented growth. While Manufacturing employment declined modestly (1.9%), it remains a crucial component of the regional economy, offering above average wages and significant future demand.

Target Cluster Summary: Employment and Wages (2022-2024)

Source: JobsEQ® by Chmura

• Region 4’s support for advanced pharmaceutical research and manufacturing represents a unique combination of clusters. The research innovations developed at VCU’s Medicines for All Institute under the leadership of Frank Gupton has catalyzed a pharmaceutical manufacturing renaissance embedded in both the RVA and Crater areas of the region. Region 4 is a crucial player in the emphasis the Commonwealth has placed on developing a life sciences value chain across research, manufacturing and distribution.
• Efforts to address occupational skill gaps remain important. Chmura data show that nearly 27,000 job postings in the region last year were associated with key cluster occupations. Many high demand roles in IT, engineering and production management remained unfilled for extended periods. The region also faces notable hiring challenges in its new Energy cluster that provide critical infrastructure for all priority clusters.
• The Council plans to implement the key recommendations its Talent Pathways Initiative for Advanced Manufacturing and Information Technology, generating projects that foster new business-education-workforce partnerships that enhance curriculum alignment and provide a rich array of internship, apprenticeship and mentorship opportunities.
• Given the rapid transformation that AI is bringing to all clusters, the Council will work cooperatively with statewide initiatives to develop a strategic framework for the region that can guide the key investment strategies of workforce development, cluster scale-up, entrepreneurial buildout and site development.
• The Council will continue to support site development in logistics and advanced manufacturing in the smaller and in the more rural jurisdictions of the region. New data centers have become a lower priority for the larger suburban jurisdictions since the last Growth and Diversification Plan and a significant portion of future growth is likely to occur in other parts of the region.
• New business formation is increasing in the region, especially in high paying professional and scientific services. Region 4 ranked second in the state for startup activity in the fourth quarter of 2024, with 606 new startups in 2024Q4 adding 1,415 new jobs. An encouraging trend in Region 4 is the formation of 124 new startups in the professional, scientific, and technological sector in 2024 Q4. Those new startups provided jobs for 176 people and represented 12% of all new startup employment.
• The contribution that the Council has made to the buildout of the region’s entrepreneurial ecosystem buildout has been highly impactful. The Council will be supporting the implementation of Startup Virginia’s expansion to an additional location. Region 4 is also a key component of Project VITAL, a statewide initiative that brings together biotech accelerators and research universities to power life sciences entrepreneurship.