Toronto ranked the 3rd-largest tech hub in North America
Global News
A rapidly expanding tech industry and workforce here in Toronto is growing fast enough for the New York Times to rank the city the third-largest tech hub in North America.
Luna Yu is the CEO of Genecis Bioindustries, a Scarborough-based company that converts food waste into biodegradable plastics using microbe technology.
“Here is actually where we grow up bacteria that makes the precursor for making the bioplastics that we have” Yu told Global News one afternoon, pointing to the large cylindrical machines during a tour of the facility.
Yu’s start-up is part of a rapidly-expanding tech industry and workforce here in Toronto — one that’s growing fast enough for the New York Times to rank the city the third-largest tech hub in North America.
“I’m not surprised, because Toronto has always been a really great sort of hotpot for great talent — from biotech to software engineering, machine learning,” said Yu.
Tech analysts say Toronto has some key advantages that make it a magnet for tech talent. Canada’s immigration laws, for one, aid in the arrival of skilled and diverse tech talent to the city, offering global perspective.
“Over 50 per cent of the talent in Toronto is foreign-born and that is a huge advantage,” said Krista Jones, founding executive of Momentum and vice-president of Venture Success at MaRS Discovery District.
“The second part of it is the depth of work that our universities and research hubs do in terms of being able to produce the types of talent that is actually essential to the growth of the ecosystem.”
Yu agrees, knowing the benefits of those supports first hand.
