Innovation Cities Top 100 Index 2012-2013: City Rankings


All of the most recent city rankings here. (Or, all years)

 Top 100 world cities for an innovation economy in 2012-2013.
The world’s largest city classification and ranking with 450 benchmark cities classified, and top 125 cities ranked in 2012, of which the top 100 are listed below. Based on 2thinknow analysis of cities in what our analysts term the ‘global innovation economy’. Annual since 2007.

2012-13 INDEXES > TOP 100 | AMERICAS | EUROPE ASIA | EMERGING | GLOBAL | ALL YEARS

View current Media Release + Read the 2012-2013 FAQ

Rank City State Country Region Sub Region Classification Index Score
1 Boston Massachusetts United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 57
1 New York New York United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 57
3 Vienna Austria EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 57
4 San Francisco Bay Area California United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 56
5 Paris France EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 56
6 Munich Germany EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 56
7 London United Kingdom EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 56
8 Copenhagen Denmark EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 55
9 Amsterdam Netherlands EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 55
10 Seattle Washington United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 54
11 Toronto Canada AMERICAS CANADA 1 NEXUS 54
12 Los Angeles California United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 54
13 Berlin Germany EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 54
14 Hong Kong Hong Kong Hong Kong ASIA CHINA 1 NEXUS 54
15 Frankfurt Germany EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 54
16 Stockholm Sweden EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 53
17 Lyon France EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 53
18 Melbourne VIC Australia ASIA ANZ 1 NEXUS 52
19 Hamburg Germany EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 52
20 Sydney NSW Australia ASIA ANZ 1 NEXUS 52
21 Seoul Korea, South ASIA ASIA 1 NEXUS 52
22 Washington DC District of Columbia United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 52
23 Philadelphia Pennsylvania United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 52
24 Manchester United Kingdom EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 52
25 Tokyo Tokyo Japan ASIA JAPAN 1 NEXUS 52
26 Chicago Illinois United States AMERICAS USA 1 NEXUS 52
27 Stuttgart Germany EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 52
28 Tel Aviv Israel EUROPE MID-EAST 1 NEXUS 52
29 Shanghai Shanghai China ASIA CHINA 1 NEXUS 51
30 Singapore Singapore ASIA ASIA 1 NEXUS 51
31 Montreal Canada AMERICAS CANADA 1 NEXUS 50
32 Kyoto Kyoto Japan ASIA JAPAN 1 NEXUS 50
33 Brussels Belgium EUROPE EUROPE 1 NEXUS 50
34 Dubai United Arab Emirates EMERGING MID-EAST 1 NEXUS 50
35 Vancouver Canada AMERICAS CANADA 1 NEXUS 50
36 Helsinki Finland EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
37 Leipzig Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
38 Oslo Norway EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
39 Dallas-Fort Worth Texas United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 49
40 Marseille France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
41 Dusseldorf Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
42 Strasbourg France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
43 Austin Texas United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 49
44 Cologne Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
45 The Hague Netherlands EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
46 Milan Italy EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 49
47 Osaka Osaka Japan ASIA JAPAN 2 HUB 49
48 Raleigh-Durham North Carolina United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 49
49 San Diego California United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 49
50 Orlando Florida United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 49
51 Portland Oregon United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
52 Minneapolis-St Paul Minnesota United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
53 Beijing Beijing China ASIA CHINA 2 HUB 48
54 Bordeaux France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 48
55 Prague Czech Republic EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 48
56 Barcelona Spain EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 48
57 Denver Colorado United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
58 Budapest Hungary EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 48
59 Edinburgh United Kingdom EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 48
60 Houston Texas United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
61 Atlanta Georgia United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
62 Miami Florida United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 48
63 Toulouse France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
64 Newark New Jersey United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
65 Baltimore Maryland United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
66 Kuala Lumpur Malaysia ASIA ASIA 2 HUB 47
67 Quebec Canada AMERICAS CANADA 2 HUB 47
68 Abu Dhabi United Arab Emirates EMERGING MID-EAST 2 HUB 47
69 Rotterdam Netherlands EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
70 Dresden Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
71 Shenzhen Guangdong China ASIA CHINA 2 HUB 47
72 Zurich Switzerland EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
73 Karlsruhe Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
74 Moscow Russia EUROPE RUSSIA 2 HUB 47
75 Rome Italy EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
76 Hannover Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
77 Santa Ana-Anaheim California United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
78 Nantes France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
79 Pittsburgh Pennsylvania United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
80 Kobe Hyogo Japan ASIA JAPAN 2 HUB 47
81 Kansas City KO/MO United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
82 Geneva Switzerland EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 47
83 Tampa Florida United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 47
84 St Petersburg Russia EUROPE RUSSIA 2 HUB 47
85 Brisbane QLD Australia ASIA ANZ 2 HUB 47
86 Montpellier France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
87 Richmond Virginia United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 46
88 Torino Italy EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
89 Istanbul Turkey EUROPE MID-EAST 2 HUB 46
90 Ann Arbor Michigan United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 46
91 Auckland New Zealand ASIA ANZ 2 HUB 46
92 Glasgow United Kingdom EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
93 Mexico City Mexico AMERICAS LATIN AMERICA 2 HUB 46
94 Madrid Spain EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
95 Taipei Taiwan ASIA CHINA 2 HUB 46
96 Aachen Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
97 Bangkok Thailand ASIA ASIA 2 HUB 46
98 Providence Rhode Island United States AMERICAS USA 2 HUB 46
99 Nice France EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46
100 Mannheim-Heidelberg Germany EUROPE EUROPE 2 HUB 46

Innovation Classifications.

All cities are graded into award categories based on their band score. In descending order of importance to the innovation economy:

NEXUS: Critical nexus for multiple economic and social innovation segments

HUB: Dominance or influence on key economic and social innovation segments , based on global rends

NODE: Broad performance across many innovation segments, with key imbalances

INFLUENCER: Competitive in some segments, potential or imbalanced

UPSTART: Potential steps towards relative future performance in a few innovation segments.

Regional Classifications.

Regions are defined as follows:

AMERICAS: North and South America

EUROPE: The U.N. defined Europe with European union, Western Russia, Israel and some Turkish cities

ASIA: Asia and Oceania (Australia/NZ)

EMERGING: Mid-East, Africa, Turkey and Caucasus states.

There are further sub regions divisions since 2012, and the Index can also be analyzed this way.

Full details.

Purchase City Benchmarking Data: All data for a single city or a mix of indicators to compare cities.

Read the analyst city report to understand the underlying framework and thinking.

Or select a Service Package for a package of analysis on cities.

Methodology in brief.

The Index is the most comprehensive city ranking and scoring. Each city was selected from 1,540 cities based on basic factors of health, wealth, population, geography as well as potential relative to peers. The final 450 cities had data extracted the city benchmarking data program on 162 indicators, and this was reduced to 445 published cities. Each of the benchmarking data was scored by analysts using best available qualitative analysis and quantitative statistics (see City Benchmarking Data to purchase city data).

Underlying data was then balanced against current global trends, by analysts to form a simplified 3 factor score for Cultural Assets, Human Infrastructure and Networked Markets. For city classification, these scores were competitively graded into 5 bands (Nexus, Hub, Node, Influencer, Upstart) based on how broad based (multiple indicators) the city performance was.

The top 30% of cities in the Nexus and Hub were ranked by analysts based on comparison of current innovation potential.

From this global Index 4 regional indexes for Americas, Europe, Asia and Emerging are then also produced.

Please note the full list above is classified (Node, Influencer, Upstart) not ranked except where a rank is noted. Rankings are just for general information. A node ranking is considered globally competitive. More discussion and questions answered in this  FAQ.

For more details on methodology, please see the FAQ or order the Innovation Cities Analysis Report.

Reproduction of this list.

The indexes and supporting materials are copyright and used under license by 2thinknow. You may reproduce the statistics and indexes in any reasonable form, graphics, or data mash-up as long as you attribute it to 2thinknow and do not modify the numbers or otherwise mislead. The easy correct way to do this is as follows:

Source: 2thinknow Innovation Cities™ Index 2012-2013: www.innovation-cities.com [or the link of the page you are referencing]

2thinknow do reserve all rights, including the right to ask content to be removed.

About 2thinknow Innovation Cities™ Program.

Based in Melbourne Australia, 2thinknow are the world’s first innovation agency. Established 2006 we have  designed original  models to measure and deliver innovation to cities, business seeking new markets and growth, and NGO/government clients.

2thinknow Innovation Cities™ Program to provide powerful tools for creating an innovation economy. This includes the City Benchmarking Data™ details on cities by segment globally, recently launched local innovation forum events, analyst reports such as the flagship Innovation Cities™ Analysis Report. In the Innovation Course, we are teaching our clients new innovation methods and practices. 2thinknow work with other clients through innovation consulting, analyst reports, projects  and innovation services, as well as a number of online resources and groups.

2thinknow have published the Innovation Cities™ Indexes city rankings free online since 2007.

This is now 445 cities in the 2012 year, and is the world’s largest and most diverse city ranking.

Contact 2thinknow here: http://innovation-cities.com/enquire/ or via twitter @2thinknow