Where are the country’s most vibrant tech and startup communities?

Just about every region in the United States has somebody with a plan for entrepreneurs and tech workers. During the pandemic, entrepreneurship and remote work boomed. Suddenly those plans got elevated into strategies. How to keep track of them?

Today, we introduce one way: the Technical.ly Map of Innovation Ecosystems, made possible by our friends at Comcast NBCUniversal. 

At start, this map of the United States shows 24 of the most dynamic innovation ecosystems in the country: places with tier one research institutions, robust entrepreneurship support systems and tech communities. One more thing dear to our hearts, as the country’s oldest local innovation news org: All these places have something like an innovation storytelling strategy.

Most locations mapped include a catalog of the ecosystem resources to get you started. Several local resource directories are included, thanks in part to our friends at EcoMap, which powers tools like Baltimore.Tech from UpSurge Baltimore and Tech Town Detroit’s Startup Navigator.

The map also features the debut of the Technical.ly Innovation Index, which uses several weights of innovation to better understand regional strengths. In this inaugural rendition, we use six inputs to assess regions: research and development spending; total regional startup value; ease of doing business rankings; economic mobility; tech workforce; and cost of living. (Fuller methodology below.)

Being on the map at all is the point. These are the ecosystems we’re following most closely, with the help of other local storytellers. If your region isn’t on the map but should be, tell me why, and let’s see if we can work together: book time with me here.

Still, a regional index leads naturally to comparison. Altogether, Technical.ly’s inaugural edition ranks the country’s top dynamic regions as follows:

Technical.ly brought journalistic rigor and our own spin to this analysis. Many familiar tech and startup innovation hubs appear on our list — and we debated internally if that was a problem. Startup valuations were just one component. We added R&D spending and tech workforce density, alongside trends in economic mobility and even cost of living. 

The top of the index reinforces what many already know: Silicon Valley is the world’s undisputed innovation capital. Even separating San Jose and San Francisco, adjacent regions with cities 50 miles apart that outline the Valley, lands them in the first and second slot.

Austin’s well-documented rise is further accentuated by rising rates of economic mobility, as documented by recent Opportunity Insights research.

Regional competitions are typically fruitless. But comparisons are insightful. For example, despite lacking a truly elite research university, Denver and Dallas perform well as relatively low-cost tech and startup hubs. Pittsburgh is mighty for its size, comparing favorably with much larger Houston, which has not transitioned its oil and gas leadership into a true startup or tech hub. 

Chicago, Philadelphia and Washington DC are weighed down by meagre economic mobility — overlooking its residents living in deep generational poverty — despite having elite research, robust startup activity and well-rounded regional economies. 

This is the ideal map to start your journey into finding the right innovation ecosystem for you. Over time, we intend to grow the map in comprehension as we also intend to bring Technically’s storytelling to more places. We’ll work closely with economic development orgs in each local region, and intend to bring together all we can for our annual Technical.ly Builders Conference next May.

Methodology: How we built the Technical.ly Innovation Index 

The inaugural Technical.ly Innovation Index is the combination of these six data sources, reflecting Technically’s Ecosystem Stack:

• Invention: Percentile of R&D expenditure by top institution in the region (2022), via the National Science Foundation
• Commercialization: Total value of exits and startup valuations in the region (H2 2021-2023), as calculated by Startup Genome Project in billions of US dollars
• Ease of doing business: Percentile ranking of the region’s primary city (2022), as determined by the Doing Business North America study at Arizona State University 
• Tech workforce: Software developer employment concentration in the region (2023), as calculated by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics
• Dynamism: Percentile ranking of the change in income for median resident aged 27 born into poverty in 1992 versus 1978 by metro commuting zone (2023), via Opportunity Insights at Harvard Business School
• Livability: Percent cost of living is lower than San Jose (2023), as calculated by NerdWallet

Each contributes to how Technical.ly evaluates local innovation ecosystems. How these are weighed and tracked may change over time, but their importance likely won’t.