If you’re a woman looking to start a business, Chicago might be a better bet than Seattle. Those are the latest findings from the Compass Global Startup Ecosystem Ranking 2015 report.
Chicago has 30 percent of its startups founded by women. Boston (29 percent), Silicon Valley (24 percent) and Los Angeles (22 percent), following respectively.
While North America ruled the global female-founded startup landscape, Seattle didn’t crack the top 10.
Why Chicago?
According to the report, the city has aggressively courted the startup scene and is “home to between 1,800-3,000 active tech startups and is now ranked No. 7 (up from No. 10 in 2012). Stakeholders including Mayor Rahm Emanuel, local investors, and 1871 (an incubator that is home to around 240 startups) have worked hard to measurably improve the local startup ecosystem — and they have succeeded. Chicago now has more than 40,000 tech jobs, 15,000 of which have been created in just the last four years.”
That news differs from a NerdWallet study published in 2014 that showed that Seattle ranked third among the best American cities for women entrepreneurs, behind D.C. and San Francisco.
The Compass Global Startup Ecosystem report also found that while the overall number of female entrepreneurs worldwide is growing — from 10 percent in 2012 to 18 percent in 2015 — men continue to dominate in startup land.
While they don’t break down how Seattle fared with women, they do show that it fell a bit in the global rankings as a startup hub overall. At No. 8, Seattle fell four spots since the last rankings in 2012:
The report cites Seattle as a desirable place for big companies to find talent — and for Silicon Valley to transplant second hubs here — but that “Seattle’s weak spot is funding. While it is sufficient to fund a major share of promising early stage startups, a lack of big VC funds causes a noticeable gap of later-stage investments — a key reason why the Seattle ecosystem is not among the global elite in 2015.”
Lack of funding ops are likely contributing to why female-led companies are lagging here, too.
The entire report is a recommended read if you’re considering starting a business. To compile it, the researchers used Compass’ data, in addition to conducting at least 200 interviews with experts across 25 countries, and surveying 11,000 participants in 40 startup ecosystems. They then ranked each ecosystem according to its performance index, funding, market reach, talent pool and startup experience.
Maybe it’s time to move to Chi-Town?
