Curious about looking to start your own tech company? Maybe you’re looking for a new and emerging tech company, but not entirely sure where to start? According to a recent study done by Expert Market, the Regional Municipality of Waterloo was ranked #1 as the best city in Canada for tech start-ups.
The Regional Municipality of Waterloo is a regional municipality located in Southern Ontario, Canada. It consists of the cities of Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge, and the townships of Wellesley, Woolwich, Wilmot, and North Dumfries. top the charts as the number one location in Canada to start a tech business. The cities rank in the top ten for every factor, with particularly strong scores in terms of the cost of living, the availability of venture capital funding and tech talent.
The study looked at how easy it is to start a tech business in 25 of Canada’s biggest cities and the top five cities for 2018 were:
1. Kitchener-Waterloo
2. Toronto
3. Montreal
4. Ottawa
5.Vancouver
The Waterloo Region placed first due to several factors. The first major one was availability of venture capital funding, with $15.5 million investment funding available per 100k people, as well as the availability of tech talent. While Canada may be short on Tech Talent, The Waterloo Region is filled with knowledgeable talent to meet the demand. The Waterloo Region is also the third most affordable city to live in, as ranked by the survey, as it is a savvy financial city and perfect choice to start a business.
The study looked at five main areas when compiling its list, cost of living, venture capital investment availability, how fast the internet is, availability of tech talent, and how entrepreneurial-friendly the city is.
On the bottom of the list is the least likely city to start a tech business and succeed is Saint John with a high cost of living that rivals Toronto, only $1.68 million in venture capital and a small pool of tech talent thanks to only one available tech course. Surprisingly though, the east-coast city has the fastest internet speed of all the 25 cities surveyed.
Curious about the Region of Waterloo? Feel free to contact me if you do have any questions!