Ottawa has taken second spot in a recent ranking of tech markets to watch.
As part of its Tech-30 report released Wednesday, CBRE compiled the “Next 10 Tech Markets to Watch,” which looks at tech employment clustering. Ottawa ranked second based on the city’s 39,000 high-tech workers, representing 27.5 per cent of office employment.
Waterloo region took top spot with a high-tech services workforce of 19,800, or 28.4 per cent of the region’s total office employment. Calgary was third with a tech workforce of 33,200 people, or 19.1 per cent of all office jobs in the city.
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CBRE’s Tech-30 report measures the industry’s impact on office demand and rents in the 30 leading tech markets in the U.S. and Canada, as well as select tech-heavy submarkets.
Vancouver and Toronto recorded the most high-tech job growth on the continent in 2020 and 2021 combined, according to the report, outpacing Austin and Seattle. Montreal rounded out the top five.
“The Tech-30 report confirms that Canadian cities continue to produce and attract some of the best and brightest tech workers in the world,” said CBRE Canada vice-chairman Paul Morassutti. “While there is a lot of uncertainty swirling around, we can take some comfort knowing that our economy is underpinned by a robust and innovative tech workforce.”
Tech growth remained strong in the wake of the pandemic, the report found, with 13 North American markets recording faster high-tech job growth in the past two years than in the prior two years, led by Toronto and Montreal.
“Even amid challenges of the past two years, the tech industry continues to add jobs and lease office space,” said Colin Yasukochi, executive director of CBRE’s Tech Insights Center.
“Since early 2020, tech has accounted for roughly one of every three office-using jobs created in the U.S. There is potential for pent-up demand to emerge once companies set their long-term hybrid work practices and economic growth picks up. Venture capital funding is on track for the second highest annual total on record after last year’s peak.”
The real estate services company’s analysis also found that, over the past two years, more than two-thirds of the top 30 North American tech markets registered office rent growth. Seven of those increased by double-digit percentages, led by Vancouver, which saw 21.6 per cent rent growth. Toronto paled in comparison, with 1.9 per cent office rent growth in the same period.
Several tech markets registered positive net absorption between 2020 and 2022, meaning companies in those markets moved into more space than they vacated. Six Tech-30 markets exceeded that threshold, including Vancouver. So did seven tech-heavy submarkets, with Vancouver’s Broadway Corridor among them.
Office space available for sublease in the Tech-30 markets increased 4.9 per cent to 142 million square feet in this year’s second quarter from a year earlier, the highest total since CBRE started tracking the figures in 2012. Tech companies account for 20 per cent of that total.
