Toulouseruns on a handful of strong industries. If you’re job-hunting or weighing a move, here’s where the opportunities (and the big-name employers) are.
Top industries & employers
Aeronautics
Airbus, ATR, Liebherr-Aerospace, Safran, Collins Aerospace, Latécoère
Airbus's headquarters and its final assembly lines for the A320, A330 and A350 families are at Blagnac, and the supplier ecosystem around them is the single largest private employer base in the region.
Space
CNES, Thales Alenia Space, Airbus Defence and Space, ONERA
The CNES Toulouse Space Centre is the largest space centre in Europe, and the satellite manufacturing and operations cluster around it is the deepest in the EU — much of it on cleared programmes.
Research & higher education
Université de Toulouse, ISAE-SUPAERO, ENAC, INSA, CNRS, INRAE
One of France's largest student populations outside Paris, with the national civil aviation and aerospace engineering schools both here, which is why the local engineering labour supply is so specialised.
Meteorology & earth observation
Météo-France, CNRM, Mercator Ocean International, Magellium
Météo-France's research centre and much of France's climate and ocean modelling capacity sit here alongside the satellite industry, an unusual and genuinely coupled concentration.
Health & oncology
CHU de Toulouse, Oncopole, Pierre Fabre, Evotec, Sanofi legacy sites
The Oncopole campus was built on the site of the AZF fertiliser plant destroyed in the 2001 explosion, and is now a combined hospital, research and biotech cluster in the south of the city.
Software & embedded systems
Sopra Steria, Capgemini, Thales Services, Continental, Actia, Sigfox legacy
A large digital sector, but weighted heavily toward embedded, safety-critical and industrial software serving aerospace and automotive rather than consumer products.
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