Singapore trumps Silicon Valley as top place for startup talent

It placed 12th in the overall startup ecosystem rankings.

Singapore has dethroned tech mecca Silicon Valley as the world's best place for startup talent, a report by Startup Genome project revealed.

Although it dropped two places to 12th in the overall rankings due to Chinese entrants, the report credited Singapore's policies enhancing its startup ecosystem.

It said along with a geographical location that makes Singapore an easy access point to up-and-coming tech markets in Southeast Asia, its 1,600-2,400 tech startups enjoy significant government subsidies and the country's strategies are working to establish local tech startups as globally-relevant companies.

Singapore ranks first globally in the talent factor overtaking Silicon Valley, mainly due to strong performance in access and cost sub-factors. The experience levels of Singaporean talent is comparably strong, given that 80% of the engineering and 74% of the growth teams have gained at least two years of prior startup experience already.

The report also noted that Singapore has the 6th highest percentage of immigrant founders in the world at 35%. It also has the 3rd highest level of global connectedness of all top 20 ecosystems outperforming even Silicon Valley.

More so, founders based in the city-state are the youngest in the world, with a median of 28 years. Only 27% of Singapore teams have 2-3 founders, the lowest rate in the world, and 20% lower than the next closest ecosystem.

However, Silicon Valley still dominated most of the categories, including performance, funding, market reach, and startup experience.

Singapore ranked 16th in both performance and funding, 11th in market reach, and 20th in startup experience.