Delaware’s small population has a mighty startup ecosystem that supports new business

November is State of the Local Tech Economy Month on Technical.ly’s 2024 editorial calendar.

Delaware’s tech ecosystem is small but mighty.

With a population of just one million people, the state of Delaware falls into two mid-Atlantic regions. North of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal in New Castle County, including Wilmington and Newark, is part of Greater Philadelphia, while south of the canal, including all of Kent and Sussex counties and south New Castle County, is part of the Delmarva Peninsula. 

Delaware’s overlap with the Philadelphia tech ecosystem and its proximity to multiple mid-Atlantic cities, including New York City and Washington, DC, offer access to bigger connections, making it a draw for talent that wants big city resources but a small town environment.

While a large portion of the state’s tech ecosystem is located upstate, a center of banking, life sciences and healthtech, downstate Delaware is emerging as a hub, too. It specifically focuses on blue technology, or tech related to the ocean, in its coastal region. 

Downstate rural areas are also connected to local universities Delaware State University and the University of Delaware and the agricultural technology they develop. Plus, there’s a growing downstate population with access to excellent high-speed internet that is gradually becoming a haven for remote work.

Delaware’s small-town feel, even in the city, means seemingly everyone knows everyone else — including policymakers on the local, state and Congressional levels. That kind of access is unusual, and the “small pond” environment is a draw for entrepreneurs who don’t want to get lost in the crowd.

Jobs outnumber the laborforce 

When it comes to jobs, Delaware has plenty of them — in fact, the number of available jobs in April 2024 exceeded the number of jobseekers, with 31,000 jobs and just 21,000 workers looking for them. 

This talent shortage includes tech jobs in the state’s main tech industries of advanced manufacturing, architectural and engineering, IT and software publishing, scientific research and development and telecommunications. 

The Delaware Business Roundtable has assessed that the state’s slow labor rate is connected to the high number of seniors moving to the state as it becomes a popular retirement destination and childcare access challenges. The Roundtable created the 2024 Delaware Investment Agenda to address these issues.

The number of high-tech jobs in the state was 22,687 and growing in 2023, according to data from the Tech Council of Delaware. It projects 25,511 tech jobs by 2028. The fastest-growing tech sector is IT and software publishing.

Finance dominates, and big companies retain a strong presence

Delaware is best known as a hub of finance, with major banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, PNC, M&T and WSFS having corporate offices in Wilmington. 

Banks employ a large number of software developers who go through local tech workforce development programs like Zip Code Wilmington, Code Differently and IT Works. 

Delaware is also known as the home of manufacturing giant DuPont and its spinout company Chemours, and pharmaceutical companies like Incyte. The state’s strong life sciences community is led by the Delaware BioScience Association. 

Growing sectors include green tech, with startups focused on reducing carbon emissions and reducing waste, and precision medicine, including breakthrough gene editing research.

A supportive ecosystem with resources for startups

Academic collaborations are a big part of the Delaware scene, too, especially for startups.

Delaware startups are developed on the university level through programs like the University of Delaware’s Horn Entrepreneurship and Delaware State University’s Delaware Center for Enterprise Development.

There are plenty of other orgs with similar missions, too. Startups are often supported by programs including the New Castle County Emerging Enterprise Center Incubator, the Delaware Innovation Space Science, Inc. Accelerator, the GBETA Bronze Valley Venture Lab, the CAFE Fintech Accelerator, the Delaware Coastal Society Blue Tech Accelerator and Launch Point Labs.

Plus, the Tech Council of Delaware leads ecosystem building with regular networking events and conferences. Other annual events include Millsummit, Reinventing Delaware, Swim with the Sharks and Startup302, a pitch competition that both serves local startups and draws startups to Delaware from all over the country.

So, while there’s no shortage of organizations and stakeholders pushing for a strong ecosystem, the actual amount of money coming into the innovation ecosystem can be hard to track. 

Tracking venture capital funding in Delaware can be a challenge, with a large number of companies, including 68% of Fortune 500 companies, incorporated in Delaware. Most of those companies are not located in Delaware, but their VC data occasionally gets mixed in with local VC data. 

Local Delaware companies that have successfully raised VC funds in 2024 include a $102 million raise by Synnovation Therapeutics, a $15 million raise by Truveris, and a $100,000 raise by AI photo startup Rush Roto.

State funding plays an important role in supporting Delaware Entrepreneurs, including the EDGE Grant that awards up to $100,000 grants to STEM startups and $50,000 to non-STEM startups. Launched in 2019, the program awarded its 100th business in May.

Looking ahead, Delaware is building toward a diverse and equitable talent pipeline with support for tech companies that want to come and take root — or stay rather than moving to larger, more well-known tech ecosystems.