SAN ANTONIO — The Port San Antonio Board of Directors has unanimously approved the next step in the development of Innovation Tower, an office project on the 1,900-acre Tech Port campus, located just southwest of downtown San Antonio. Port San Antonio is a public entity created to redevelop land formerly occupied by Kelly Air Force Base.
Yesterday, the board approved $7.5 million to move the tower from its preliminary phase to the finalization of architectural plans, budget and schedule. The design phase is expected to last about one year, with groundbreaking slated for 2026 and completion by 2028. Project costs are estimated at roughly $275 million, according to the San Antonio Business Journal.
The multi-story Innovation Tower, which will be located at the main entrance of the campus, will support growing demand by adding nearly 300,000 square feet of high-end office space. The tower will also include 27,000 square feet of amenity spaces such as a health and wellness center, sauna, locker rooms and a large conference room.
Pelli Clarke & Partners designed the tower, with architect Bill Butler leading the project. The tower is a component of a broad innovation campus development strategy the organization unveiled in fall 2024.
“Rising high over Tech Port and visible for miles, the tower will be a unique beacon for this community and an additional calling card for our region as a fast-moving global capital of innovation,” says Margaret Wilson-Anaglia, Port San Antonio Board chair.
In recent years, tenants at Tech Port have added over 9,000 jobs, bringing the campus-wide total employment count to 18,000. Currently, more than 80 Tech Port tenants are active in the aerospace, cybersecurity, defense, advanced manufacturing, industrial robotics and space exploration industries.
Spanning more than 10 million square feet, existing buildings at Tech Port are nearing full occupancy. Among the highly specialized facilities are aircraft maintenance hangars, industrial buildings for advanced manufacturing, a force-protected perimeter for national defense operations and numerous offices that can accommodate cybersecurity labs and other secure functions.
The advancing Innovation Tower project comes on the heels of nearly 750,000 square feet of new facilities built on the campus since 2017. These include two multi-tenant office properties, a commercial/industrial complex, a K-12 school operated by Compass Rose and a 130,000-square-foot innovation facility, the Boeing Center at Tech Port.
Multiple projects continue to advance across the Tech Port campus, including expansion of defense operations. Those developments include a large childcare facility to serve military and civilian families, additional secure facilities for Air Force cybersecurity commands, a vertiport for the next-generation electric vertical take-off and landing vehicles and an array of retail and hospitality amenities for the on-campus population as well as the surrounding neighborhoods.
— Kristin Harlow