In our increasingly technology-driven world the cities that show the greatest innovation and talent pools are attracting most attention from investors.
A report from global real estate firm JLL shows that tech-savvy cities with highly skilled workforces also attract corporations interested in hiring the best employees.
Its study analyzed 109 global cities and found that the nine leading global markets – Boston, London, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Seattle, San Jose, Sydney and Tokyo – accounted for around 37% of total annual real estate investment volumes over the past decade.
"Targeting innovative cities has now become an explicit part of investment strategies," says Carol Hodgson, Director, Global Research at JLL. "Our research also shows that innovation-centric cities appear to be more resilient to economic shocks. During the last downturn, these cities saw average real estate capital values fall less and bounce back more quickly. These include cities such as Seoul, Berlin and Chicago."
San Francisco leads the top 20 innovation geographies and San Jose, New York, and Boston also make the top 10. Toronto is the only Canadian city in the innovation list, at number 17, but fails to make the top 20 for talent concentration.
