Bengaluru Named Among World’s Top 25 High-Tech Cities

By Little India Desk | September 12, 2017

Bengaluru has emerged among the top 25 high-tech cities of the world, according to research firm 2thinknow that specializes in analyzing innovative cities. Bengaluru stands at number 19, climbing rapidly from the 49^th spot it was at last year.

The firm ranked 85 cities keeping these 10 factors in mind: number of patents filed per capita, startups, tech venture capitalists, ranking in other innovation datasets, and level of smartphone use.

Bengaluru’s rise in ranks has been due to the influx of IT companies and the city’s growing population of digital natives. According to a recent McKinsey survey, India is said to be one of the top countries with a growing population of the millennials. Two million IT professionals, 6 million indirect IT jobs, and $80 billion in IT exports are expanding the tech space here. The ranking for India’s Silicon Valley is expected to go higher next year.

India, whose growth rate is now higher than China’s, is enjoying the same boom that China did during the 1980s, ’90s and early 2000s. Beijing and Shanghai still rank higher than Bengaluru this year, occupying 16th and 17th spots, respectively.

The analysis of 2thinknow puts San Francisco, the ‘Silicon Valley’, at No. 1 spot, with its population of designers, programmers, start-up culture and venture capital scene.

The Big Apple comes behind the Silicon Valley. As per data from the New York state comptroller’s office, nearly 7,000 high-tech companies provided more than 100,000 jobs during the third quarter of 2013. New York’s integrated citywide technology LinkNYC — a free Wifi service with 500 kiosks around Manhattan available for public use — put it at the second place.

London, a city with more startups and programmers than any city in the world, is listed at No. 3. There are 34,000 tech businesses in London now, according to an Oxford Economics report. In the next decade, the report shows, there will be another 11,000, thereby creating 46,000 new jobs.

The $20 billion Crossrail project, introduced in London last year, is said to be the largest construction project in Europe. By 2018, it is expected to have 10 new train lines to connect 30 existing stations with brand new tunnels.

The analysis puts Los Angeles at No. 4. LA had more high-tech sector jobs than any other region in the US, according to a report by the LA County Economic Development Corporation. The total wealth output of the city is around $58 billion. The 2thinknow analysis found that startups and venture capital drove LA’s tech sector boom.

Ranked number 5 is the city of future, Seoul. The city files more patents than any city in the world. Seoul has developed technology that is omnipresent — the LTE beamed to our smartphones, for example. Virtual stores where you scan pictures of items to be delivered later is also being developed there. Seoul’s subway system, according to a report in Business Insider, beats the New York subway.

Taipei in Taiwan, Boston in Massachusetts, Singapore, Toronto and Chicago make the top 10. Bengaluru falls behind Montreal, which is the city to be in for industrial designers and for those who want to work in wearable technology and virtual reality sectors.

Following is the list:

1. San Francisco, California
2. New York, New York
3. London, England
4. Los Angeles, California
5. Seoul, South Korea
6. Taipei, Taiwan
7. Boston, Massachusetts
8. Singapore
9. Toronto, Canada
10. Chicago, Illinois
11. Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas
12. Tokyo, Japan
13. Stockholm, Sweden
14. Vancouver, Canada
15. Amsterdam, the Netherlands
16. Beijing, China
17. Shanghai, China
18. Montreal, Canada
19. Bangalore, India
20. Shenzhen, China
21. Berlin, Germany
22. Hong Kong, China
23. Copenhagen, Denmark
24. Barcelona, Spain
25. Washington, DC