The University of Texas at San Antonio is set to play a pivotal role in transforming San Antonio into the central hub for Gov. Greg Abbott’s Texas Cyber Command, the university’s president told the San Antonio Report on Tuesday.
UTSA’s School of Data Science played host to a national summit focused on driving innovation in the cybersecurity field on Tuesday, welcoming parties from all over Texas and from Washington, D.C., to discuss why San Antonio is uniquely positioned to be this new hub for Texas.
During his State of the State address last month, Abbott named the creation of a Texas Cyber Command in San Antonio as one of his seven priority items, surprising some local leaders who said they hadn’t heard this idea previously.
UTSA’s President Taylor Eighmy was not among those taken by surprise, however.
In fact, discussions about the command have been ongoing for more than a year, he explained Tuesday.
“My team and I have been in close coordination with the governor’s office about this new Texas Cyber Command agency that will be affiliated with UT San Antonio,” he said. “The bill for that just got filed last night to authorize it … and it’s out for comment from members of the appropriate committees up in Austin,” Eighmy added, referring to Senate Bill 2176.
If the bill passes as is, Texas Cyber Command would be “a component institution of The University of Texas System,” and would be “administratively attached to the University of Texas at San Antonio.”
UTSA is well-positioned to lead this initiative, Eighmy said. In January 2023, UTSA opened the $91.8 million National Security Collaboration Center and School of Data Science in downtown San Antonio at 506 Dolorosa St., and in December, the university revealed plans to launch the College of AI, Cyber, and Computing, with an anticipated formal debut in fall 2025.
Eighmy suggested Tuesday that the university plans to lobby for more funding to support the Abbott-blessed effort.
“We have some special requests in place that are going to support this new College of AI, Cyber, and Computing, and that’s still in play,” Eighmy said. “There’s a lot of activity up in the capitol, and we’re advocating for all sorts of things. We have a lot of work to do.”
The college will house 6,000 students and staff at the university’s downtown San Antonio campus, contributing to downtown’s development, Eighmy said.
San Antonio’s economic landscape, which is bolstered by the presence of the NSA and Department of Defense, helps position the city to be a major cybersecurity hub, he added.
Eighmy is one of the many reasons UTSA was selected for the summit, said Deborah Wince-Smith, president and CEO of the Council on Competitiveness. The Council is a non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C. with the goal of increasing the United States’ economic competitiveness in the global marketplace. His role as a commissioner on the National Commission of Innovation and Competitiveness within the Council on Competitiveness was integral in the university’s selection, Wince-Smith added.
”San Antonio is really ground zero in America for our cybersecurity infrastructure with the Air Force, the Joint Base, and many other infrastructures here,” she said. “We’re thrilled to bring all these people together to discuss this critical topic for the U.S., competitiveness and national security.”
During one of the panel discussions Tuesday, Brad Morrison, a member of the board of directors of the Texas Space Commission, said the presence of such a hub will also help Texas continue to become a leader in technology — especially space tech.
”And the beneficiaries of that will be communities from Houston, San Antonio — all the way up to El Paso,” he said. “These are great opportunities for us.”
