Cambridge is the leading regional tech city in the UK thanks to its combination of high levels of VC funding, venture capital rounds, advertised tech salaries, number of unicorns (tech companies worth more than $1bn) and ‘futurecorns’, according to new analysis for the UK’s Digital Economy Council by Dealroom and job search engine Adzuna.

Manchester was only narrowly beaten by Cambridge to the number two position, and Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast are also in the top ten for capital raised, showing how the tech sector has spread across all regions and countries in the UK. The number of jobs in Manchester increased by 164.6% in 2021 and the highest advertised average salaries outside London were in Edinburgh - £58,405.

With more money than ever flowing into UK tech - £29.4bn in 2021, up 2.3x from the year before - almost £9bn of all VC invested went into startups and scaleups outside London and the South East and the regions are home to nine of the 29 unicorns formed this year. The combined value of UK tech companies founded since 2000 is now £540bn, after the biggest year-on-year increase since 2013/14.

Levelling Up Power Tech League 2021:
1. Cambridge
2. Manchester
3. Oxford
4. Edinburgh
5. Bristol
6. Leeds
7. Birmingham
8. Newcastle
9. Cardiff
10. Belfast

UK tech captured more than a third of investment into Europe
The £29.4bn raised by UK startups and scale-ups was double the figure raised in Germany (£14.7bn) and almost three times that raised by French companies (£9.7bn). UK tech investment accounted for a third of the total £89.5bn that flowed into the European tech ecosystem this year.