The Big Apple Bitten by the Big Tech City: Toronto Rises to the Top!

Toronto is fast becoming the tech capital of the world, and it’s easy to see why. With an abundance of talent, a vibrant culture, and a great quality of life, it’s no wonder that the city is quickly becoming one of the most sought-after tech hubs in the world. From tech giants to startups, Toronto is quickly becoming the place to be for technology, and the city is now dubbed “The Big Apple Bitten by the Big Tech City.” With the city continuing to rise to the top, it’s exciting to think of all the possibilities that the tech community here could bring.

The pandemic resulted in a record-breaking number of job losses worldwide in 2020, making it the year of unforeseen surprises. However, during this time, Toronto in particular experienced exponential growth.

According to a CBRE report, Toronto is the North American high-tech city with the fastest growth. CBRE Group, a real estate and investment company, ranked the 30 biggest tech markets on the continent in its Tech-30 2021 report, which also examined the effects of the tech sector on office space.

According to their research, Toronto saw a 26.4% increase in high-tech jobs from 2019 to 2020, outpacing Silicon Valley. Seattle, up 22%, Vancouver, up 21%, New York, up 18%, and Austin, up 16%, were in second place after Austin.

High-tech behemoths were able to quickly pivot and adapt while COVID-19 lockdowns threatened and shuttered small and medium businesses. As a result, over 219,000 new jobs—40,200 of which were added in Toronto—had been created in North America by June 2021.

This remarkable growth rate is largely attributable to the pandemic, which advanced high-tech businesses and individual technology use, accelerating the “economy’s digital transformation”. This, combined with the “high-tech’s resiliency and integration with other industries”, helped rocket Toronto’s growth to a 26 percent increase, beating out all other cities in the continent. The annual CBRE report published just a year ago in 2020 ranked Toronto in sixth place.

Another driving force in this staggering growth trend is the Global Talent Stream – a program that makes it easier for Canadian employers to recruit highly skilled workers from other countries. This initiative was proposed in 2017 to aid in promoting Toronto’s high-tech industry, and it appears to have contributed to this success. Canadians need not worry about losing their jobs, despite some criticism directed at this program.

In actuality, the Toronto Region employs more than 290,000 people in tech-related jobs, and over 25,000 students enroll in STEM-related programs each year. It goes without saying that there is high-tech employment available for everyone since the market is growing.

Toronto has become a global center for new media and technology innovation thanks to the development of high-speed communications and industry-leading research. Large high-tech corporations like Amazon, Doordash, Google, Netflix, Shopify, Uber, and Tiktok are already based in the city. Additionally, the $135 million Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence opened its doors in 2017 and contributed significantly to the city’s expansion. In the upcoming years, we can anticipate that the city will host a lot of new technology offices as it continues to attract the interest of investors and forward-thinking businesses.

One of the most sought-after cities in Canada and the capital of its business community is already Toronto. Toronto is ranked as the ninth-most high-tech city in the world by Business Insider, with San Francisco taking the top spot. We can therefore expect Toronto to advance and become the “New Silicon Valley” as the city’s technology industry grows.

There is a demand for real estate when there are employment opportunities, as we have observed with some of the largest cities in the world. In addition to ranking Toronto’s tech growth, the CBRE report also found that Toronto had the highest growth in office space. Consequently, Toronto will only keep getting more livable and more attractive as an investment, which will fuel the thriving real estate market and, by extension, the economy.

Toronto isn’t the only city to pay attention to, though. Two additional Canadian cities were listed in the top 10 growing markets in the same report. This includes Montreal, which placed sixth, and both of the top two cities—Vancouver, which came in third—creating over 12,000 new jobs between 2019 and 2020.

The report also reveals the top 10 markets to watch out for, with three Canadian cities rounding out the top 10. Ottawa came in second and Calgary came in fourth, with Waterloo coming in first. When looking for a new location to invest in, these cities should not be disregarded as high-tech job growth is heating them up.