The report identifies emerging tech hubs in most regions of North America, from Huntsville in the Southeast to Albany in the Northeast to Las Vegas in the West. Canada landed three cities on the list.

These up-and-coming markets are separate from the 50 larger tech markets that CBRE’s report ranks in its Tech Talent Scorecard. In contrast, the ‘next 25’ markets are ranked by a narrower set of criteria than the top 50, including tech talent supply, wages, tech talent concentration, recent tech talent growth rates and their outlook.

Nationally, tech talent job growth of 3.6% in the year ended in 2023 marked a slowdown from the 7.3% growth rate of 2022. Less hiring of tech talent by tech companies created an opportunity for non-tech companies, which collectively already employ 60% of U.S. tech talent, to hire more. Both the Professional & Business Services and the Transportation, Warehousing & Wholesale sectors hired more tech talent in the U.S. last year than the tech industry.

“Increased demand for specialized skill sets in artificial intelligence has fueled tech talent job growth across all sectors. We anticipate more tech hiring to take place this year and into 2025 as companies further develop and adopt this technology,” said Colin Yasukochi, executive director of CBRE’s Tech Insights Center.

The leaderboard of the ‘next 25’ markets is filled with markets that posted double-digit growth in tech jobs since 2018.

Huntsville also stood out in the report in other key areas:

• Huntsville’s total tech employment of 25,910 was the largest of the emerging markets, followed by Omaha at 23,330.
• Its average tech wage of $114,085 was fourth highest among the emerging markets behind Stamford, Trenton and Colorado Springs.
• Huntsville’s average software developer wage of $113,774 has grown by 9.7% since 2018.
• Huntsville generated 988 tech talent degree graduates in 2022.