South Florida is among the Top 20 markets in the world for technology startups, according to a new report from Startup Genome and the Global Entrepreneurship Network.
The Miami metro area ranked No. 16 in the Global Startup Ecosystem Report 2024, an analysis of more than 300 ecosystems across the globe. It looks at factors such as venture capital funding, talent attraction and other trends to identify the best locations for early-stage startups.
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That's up seven places from 2023, when Miami came in at No. 23.
The report looked at performance, funding, talent and experience, market reach and knowledge to devise an overall ranking. Miami scored best for market reach (8), performance (7) and funding (7), but lagged in talent and experience (3) and knowledge (1).
The talent and experience category considers factors such as the number of STEM university students, the size of the life sciences market and software engineer salaries. The knowledge category looks at metrics such as the number of patents and research publications coming out the ecosystem.
Still, there's been considerable progress in Miami, which has jumped 15 places in the rankings since 2022.
"While its late-stage funding declined in 2023, several Miami startups show strong promise, including the Blockchain startup QuickNode, which raised a $88 million series B round; and the Fintech startup NYMBUS [which] raised a $70 million series B round," the report said.
South Florida was also home to two major technology exits over the past year, a period where mergers and acquisitions were down globally. Redzone Software's sale to Thoma Bravo-owned QAD for $885 million was among the top deals of the 2023, the report said. Freightos, a supply chain startup, also went public in a $500 million special purpose acquisition company deal.
Notably, the Miami area ranked ahead of other more established technology markets like Chicago (17) and Seattle (20).
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The report's top three startup ecosystems have remained unchanged since 2020: California's Silicon Valley, New York City and London. Los Angeles and Tel Aviv, Israel, tied at No. 4.
The goal of the Global Startup Ecosystem report is to provide the data that businesses, policymakers and other stakeholders need to build "innovation clusters" across the world.
"Creating more entrepreneurs is the most important thing that we can do as an ecosystem of enablers and policymakers," said Jonathan Ortmans, president of the Global Entrepreneurship Network.
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