What a new innovation index tells us about Delaware

Will Delaware lead, or will it follow? 

Local champions certainly say they take seriously innovation, entrepreneurship and tech workforce. But I’ve had my doubts of late. This year marks 15 years of publishing Technical.ly, and a full decade of reporting on innovation in the First State. 

After years of talk, entrepreneurship really boomed in the pandemic. Remote work growth and industry consolidation both seem to benefit Delaware — beachside Lewes and suburban Wilmington seem well suited to climate-resilient economic futures. While a large portion of the state’s tech ecosystem is located upstate — a center of banking, life sciences and healthtech that’s part of the Greater Philadelphia region — downstate Delaware is emerging as a hub, too, one that focuses on ocean-centric blue tech. 

American cities had a startup rebirth in the 2010s, and it seems to me that US states are taking more leadership in the 2020s. 

To date though, Delaware’s talk and action haven’t matched. Exceptions exist: the state’s banking executives are forced to have a national perspective, even while employing tech workers locally; Desa Burton’s coding bootcamp Zip Code Wilmington, Robert Herrera’s coworking operation The Mill and Zakiyah Ali’s Tech Council of Delaware all have big ambitions.

These leaders and themes appear in Technical.ly’s second annual State of the Delaware Tech Economy report, released today. It’s part of our deeper dive into the communities we follow closest: Find them all here. Join us tomorrow, Wednesday, Dec. 11, at 12 p.m. ET for a LinkedIn Live webinar discussing themes from the reports.

Take a look at Delaware’s recent innovation progress: 

• For the last four years, the president of the United States was Delaware’s proudest native son, and the Biden administration put billions of dollars toward advanced technologies, but very little transformation has taken place here.
• Delaware smartly bid with Philadelphia for federal funding for a precision medicine cluster, and though it wasn’t funded, it did earn a tech hub designation — a vote of confidence in smart, cross-state regionalism.  
• The Delaware Business Roundtable’s thoughtful Investment Agenda, released this year, seems full of good ideas for leadership, but too little progress has been made so far.
• Development in Wilmington and near the University of Delaware campus is welcome, but too modest for a state that claims to want to stand on its own. 

Incoming Governor Matt Meyer’s administration has an opportunity to run with innovation in the new year. But is being a follower too comfortable for most existing stakeholders involved? 

Inside our State of the Delaware Tech Economy report, we look at Technical.ly’s brand new Map of Innovation Ecosystems, released Monday.

The map is designed to help get started in any of the country’s most vibrant tech and startup hubs. It also includes the first go of our Innovation Index, which measures the regions we track on six indicators that are informed by the Ecosystem Stack we developed from our reporting.

We debated internally as to whether Delaware should appear on the map and in our index at all. 

I see two paths developing in American tech-led economic development: Statewide strategies and regional coalitions. Delaware could benefit from both, putting forward a serious, small-state innovation engagement strategy and eagerly contributing to Greater Philadelphia, which hovers around the top 10 innovation markets but could use the help.

Star programs like Zip Code, Tech Council, The Mill, the Horn Program for Entrepreneurship at University of Delaware and the Mill Summit are on a short list of Delaware efforts standing tall, but the Roundtable’s Investment Agenda risks collecting dust if these efforts and others aren’t leveled up. 

We at Technical.ly want to do our part, contributing to and amplifying that narrative — but right now, there’s a lot of noise in the signal.