Cincinnati remains one of the best cities in the Midwest to operate a startup, according to a new study.
Cincinnati landed at the No. 10 spot for startups in the Midwest, registering a score of 20.4. The Queen City finished two spots lower than last year's ranking. Cincinnati has only finished outside of the top 10 once in the study's four years, finishing in the No. 11 spot in 2018.
This is the verdict from Chicago firm M25, who published this study to provide an objective benchmark to help companies and individuals alike understand how micro-environments within the Midwest are performing.
Broadly speaking, M25 evaluates cities based on three things: startup activity, access to resources and business climate. It measured 27 different variables from 18 data sources, including Pitchbook venture data, tech talent data from HumanPredictions, and U.S. census data.
Looking at Cincinnati's rankings even further, the city ranks No. 11 for overall startup activity, No. 9 for access to resources, and No. 12 for business climate.
Chicago — which had a score of 48.9 — took the top ranking for its tech ecosystem in the Midwest, a position its held in M25's rankings for each of the four years the firm has published its annual report. Following Chicago is Minneapolis at No. 2, then Pittsburgh at No. 3, Indianapolis at No. 4, and St. Louis at No. 5.
Readers can see the full 2020 rankings here.
