Are you looking for the next creatively charged environment for your company? This post is going to focus on the top cities around the world that are renowned for their innovation.
If you can manage to glare through the pollution of this huge city, you can see that Beijing is an economic wonderland boasting buildings like Koolhaas’s CCTV HQ. China’s economy is huge, and its culture is woven deeply throughout history. Its arts scene is booming too! With this much innovation, it’s no wonder that a lot of companies have found success here.
It should come as no surprise to find Los Angeles on this list. It is the epicentre of corporate innovation. Look no further than Walt Disney Company to see just how much this city has to offer. While we often link L.A. to the movie industry, it’s not limited by that label. It boasts massive theme parks, video game companies, and popular sports teams. Massively successful start-up companies have been founded in L.A., including Netflix, Oculus Rift, and One-Dollar Shave Club.
Education has helped Mexico City become one of the top innovation cities in the world. Did you know that Mexico has more undergrads that the United States? Most people are shocked by this fact. Furthermore, Latin America has a deep culture that Mexico City spares no expense to celebrate. With a booming middle class and a high level of education, a lot of companies are opening their doors in Mexico City.
Washington produces more engineers than any other U.S. state! Seattle gets more than $1 billion in VC funds annually. In fact, Google opened their research lab in the Fremont District. Tech start-ups are being attracted to Seattle in record troves. If that’s not enough, Seattle’s cultural credibility has been on the rise as they continue to open new cultural wonders, including the $85 million Olympic Sculpture Park.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
Doha has been investing more in its culture and knowledge as they come to the realisation that oil won’t be around forever. They have invested in the reopening newspapers and expanding Al-Jazeera. However, one of their most innovative moves is Education City, where RAND Institute, Georgetown Cornell, and Northwestern have all opened campuses. With that many new recruits being trained every year, companies will have a pool of innovative talent to choose from.
Orlando is known as the home of Mickey Mouse, but it is also the hub for a couple of massively over industries – interactive gaming and biotech. Electronic Arts is based in Orlando, which has paved the way for hundreds of other game publishers. Meanwhile, the popular Burnham Institute for Medical Research is also based in Orlando.
Toronto is known as Canada’s next Silicon Valley. Companies like Blackberry and the Waterloo company all started their journey in Toronto. However, the MaRS Discovery District seems to get most of the attention. It’s the home of innovative labs like Johnson & Johnson and Manulife/John Hancock. Venture firms Etsy and Airbnb are also based here. Even Google has stepped into this innovative city, opening an office back in 2012.
Paris is considered one of the top cities for start-up companies due to its subsidies and public grants. Entrepreneurs who have found their way here are interested in sharing economy and artificial intelligence. Paris has been the birthplace of so many great start-up success stories that entrepreneurs worldwide are gazing an eye in its direction.
Finally, we come to another innovative city where start-up businesses are seeing a lot of success. Companies like Freelancer.com and Atlassian are prime examples of solid startups that were founded in Sydney.
The WorkFlow podcast is hosted by Steve Glaveski with a mission to help you unlock your potential to do more great work in far less time, whether you're working as part of a team or flying solo, and to set you up for a richer life.
To help you avoid stepping into these all too common pitfalls, we’ve reflected on our five years as an organization working on corporate innovation programs across the globe, and have prepared 100 DOs and DON’Ts.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT