Austin is the state capital of Texas and the county seat of Travis County. Situated in the region of Central Texas, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 16th-largest in the United States. As of the 2005 U.S. Census estimate, Austin had a population of 690,252. The city is the core cultural and economic center of the Austin–Round Rock metropolitan area with a population of 1.4 million.

Austin is home to The University of Texas at Austin, one of the largest universities in the country and is the flagship institution of The University of Texas System—the largest state system of higher education in Texas.

Thousands of graduates each year from the engineering and computer science programs at The University of Texas at Austin provide a steady source of young, talented and driven employees that help to fuel Austin's technology sector. The metro Austin area also has much lower housing costs than, for example, Silicon Valley.

Austin's biggest employers include the State of Texas, The University of Texas, the SETON Healthcare Network, Dell, IBM and Freescale Semiconductor (spun off from Motorola in 2004). Other high-tech companies in Austin include Apple Computer, Vignette, AMD, Applied Materials, Intel, Motive Inc, Cirrus Logic, Samsung, National Instruments, United Devices and Sun Microsystems. The proliferation of technology companies has led to the region's nickname, "the Silicon Hills," (Austin was originally "Silicon Gulch", but it seems that San Jose, California already has that distinction) and has spurred rapid development that has greatly expanded the city to the north and south.

The median income for a household in the city was $42,689, and the median income for a family was $54,091. Males had a median income of $35,545 vs. $30,046 for females. 

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