Despite Brexit and the coronavirus pandemic, London maintained its second-place ranking tied with New York for the second year in a row. London has risen up the league table in the last few years, climbing from number eight in 2012 when the first rankings were released to number two in 2020. Silicon Valley held onto the top spot this year while Beijing and Boston came in fourth and fifth respectively. A number of other UK hubs also featured in the reports ‘Top 100 Emerging Ecosystems’ including: Bristol, Manchester-Liverpool, Birmingham, Edinburgh-Glasgow, Belfast and Durham. London is one of the best cities in the world for access to funding and quality and activity in the investment ecosystem (referring to the number of local investors, investor experience and their level of activity). London has already seen record levels of VC tech investment this year, with the UK capital’s tech startups receiving USD13.3 billion in the first seven months (January to July), more than the USD10.9 billion raised in the whole of 2020. London’s impressive start to 2021 has been boosted by major funding rounds for Revolut (USD800 million), Checkout.com (USD450 million) and Hopin (USD400m). Compared with other international tech hubs, the research found that startups in London have access to deeper pools of capital, with an average seed round of USD653k, ahead of the global average of USD494k. London is currently home to over 1,370 VC firms – more than any other European city, providing access to a vast network of investors and a depth of capital in the ecosystem. A number of global investment firms have also increased their presence in London recently, with Index Ventures announcing a USD3.1 billion fund for European start-ups in July and the news that Silicon Valley based VC Sequoia Capital had expanded its footprint in the UK capital.
London is also recognized for its world class talent pool, with the city ranking highly across the board for quality and access to Tech and Life Sciences talent. With four of the world’s top ten universities located in or close to London, the city is home to 484k software developers3 as well as a high number of Life Sciences-focused universities and degree programmes. The number of fast-growing London-based tech companies choosing to list on the London Stock Exchange has been on the rise in 2021, with highly anticipated IPOs from Darktrace and Wise amongst some of the biggest listings on the AIM and the main market this year. “London’s fundamental strengths in talent, global connectedness and access to funding are the reasons it continues to feature highly in our rankings and remains the number one startup hub in Europe. It’s important for startup hubs all over the world to connect to top ecosystems. As a top three ecosystem London has an important role to play in galvanizing the global startup community.