5 things to know about manufacturing along the South Texas-Mexico border

Rio Grande Valley economic development leaders have spent years chasing major industrial investments. At the 2026 North American Development Bank Summit, the conversation turned to what comes after companies decide to invest, especially in the manufacturing sector. 

How do you attract their suppliers? Where will tens of thousands of workers come from? And can roads, utilities and other infrastructure keep pace?

Those questions surfaced during “Made in North America: Manufacturing Competitiveness,” a panel focused on strengthening supply chains, attracting investment and improving North America’s manufacturing competitiveness.

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The discussion included two Rio Grande Valley leaders — Joaquin Spamer, founder and CEO of CIL Group, and Pete Sepulveda, Cameron County administrator and executive director of the Cameron County Regional Mobility Authority — along with Christian Perez Giese, executive vice president and director at CBRE, and Emmanuel Loo, the deputy secretary of the economy for the Mexican state of Nuevo León – a major economic hub connected to South Texas. 

Here are five takeaways for Rio Grande Valley businesses: 

1. Cameron County says four companies could bring $40 billion and 30,000 jobs

Sepulveda offered one of the biggest numbers during the discussion.

“In Cameron County, we have four different companies that, among them they are looking at a $40 billion dollar investment in the county,” Sepulveda said.

Those four companies alone could account for more than 30,000 jobs in and around the Port of Brownsville, he said.

Sepulveda did not identify the four companies during that portion of the panel, and the figures represent potential investment and jobs rather than development already completed.

But the county is preparing for considerably more.

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Sepulveda said Cameron County projects it could attract enough industry over the next five to eight years to generate between 50,000 and 60,000 jobs.

That growth would extend beyond the companies making the initial investments.

Sepulveda said suppliers serving major projects are also looking at relocating to the region.

2. Landing the giant project is only the beginning

A major manufacturer doesn’t operate alone.

It buys equipment, components, and services from other businesses. If some of those suppliers establish operations nearby, one major investment can help create a much larger network of companies and jobs.

Nuevo León, in Mexico, offers an example.

Loo said the state has built an extensive automotive manufacturing supply chain that includes hundreds of Tier 1 suppliers — companies that sell parts and components directly to major manufacturers.

The state also works to connect incoming companies with businesses already operating there.

That model is increasingly relevant to the Valley as major investments in space, maritime manufacturing, energy, computing and other industries create potential customers for suppliers of their own.

Sepulveda said Cameron County is already seeing interest from suppliers looking at the region.

What’s less clear is how many companies have actually established Valley operations specifically because their customers are here.

That distinction could become increasingly important as the region tries to turn a collection of large projects into a broader manufacturing base.

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3. AI manufacturing is much bigger than data centers

Data centers may be among the most visible pieces of the artificial intelligence boom, but Loo said the manufacturing opportunity extends well beyond the facilities themselves.

Nuevo León is seeing companies produce the equipment required to build and operate the computing infrastructure behind AI, Loo, the economic secretary, said. 

That includes servers, power supplies, water-cooling systems, air-conditioning and chiller equipment, connectors and fiber optics.

The value of those products can be enormous.

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Loo said a truck carrying advanced computer servers can contain between $150 million and $300 million worth of equipment. One of the latest Nvidia server racks can cost around $10 million, he said.

That helps explain another shift taking place in manufacturing along the border.

Perez Giese said truck traffic doesn’t necessarily have to increase significantly for the value of goods crossing the border to do the same. As factories make more technologically sophisticated products, a similar number of trucks can carry considerably more valuable cargo.

He pointed to Taiwanese server manufacturers operating in Ciudad Juárez as one example of the more advanced manufacturing projects appearing in northern Mexico.

4. The Valley’s manufacturing pitch increasingly includes Mexico

Spamer argued that the Valley’s competitive position looks different when South Texas and northern Tamaulipas are presented as one economic region.

He is involved with RioPlex, an initiative that markets the four-county region of the Rio Grande Valley—Hidalgo, Cameron, Willacy, and Starr —along with communities in the Mexican state of northern Tamaulipas as a combined binational region.

Spamer described that footprint as having roughly 3.5 million people, four seaports, seven international airports, more than 600 manufacturing companies, and 64 industrial parks.

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For manufacturers and suppliers, the significance goes beyond population size.

A company serving a major industrial customer in South Texas doesn’t necessarily have to place every part of its operation on the U.S. side of the border.

Northern Tamaulipas already has an established manufacturing base, while South Texas provides access to major customers, ports and the U.S. market.

That creates the possibility of a supplier network that operates across the border rather than stopping at it.

Perez Giese, whose work includes industrial real estate in Ciudad Juárez, said companies have long used that relationship to divide operations between the United States and Mexico.

But he also cautioned that uncertainty is slowing some manufacturing investment in northern Mexico.

Perez Giese estimated current activity at roughly one-third of what he would normally expect as companies wait for greater certainty about trade and government policy before making long-term investment decisions.

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5. None of this works without roads, power and workers

Attracting more manufacturers and suppliers also means finding somewhere to put them — and giving them the infrastructure and workforce they need to operate.

Sepulveda said Cameron County has identified about $4 billion in transportation projects it believes it will need to attract and sustain the industrial growth expected in the county.

The county has already had to adjust to the demands created by particularly large projects.

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Sepulveda said Cameron County assigned staff specifically to SpaceX to keep up with building permit reviews, inspections, and certificates of occupancy.

“SpaceX, I had dedicated staff assigned just to SpaceX so that they could review and keep up with the review of any plans submitted by SpaceX for building permits,” Sepulveda said.

Without dedicated employees, he said, moving that volume of development through the normal permitting process would take considerably longer.

Infrastructure wasn’t the only constraint discussed.

Panelists repeatedly pointed to workers, education, electricity, water, and other basic requirements companies consider before investing.

The workforce question became particularly relevant when an audience member asked why the two sides of the border continue to approach workforce development separately if the region increasingly markets itself as a single manufacturing economy.

Sepulveda pointed to previous cooperation between what was then the University of Texas at Brownsville and a technical institution in Matamoros and said stronger connections between the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley and universities and technical institutions in Mexico are worth exploring.

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The discussion underscored how the Valley’s industrial challenge is changing.

For years, much of the focus has been on landing the big project.

If the investments now being discussed materialize, the next opportunity could be building the network around them — the suppliers, workers, and infrastructure that turn a handful of major projects into a much larger manufacturing economy.