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Pittsburgh Tech Firms Rake In Nearly $700 Million In Investments In 2017

Tech organizations say the city is attractive to investors because it costs little to live and run a business here, and the companies that are settling are seeing growth.

A new report finds that Pittsburgh tech companies received $687 million in investments in 2017, which is the highest for a single year in the past decade.

The review was conducted by the business consultant firm Ernst & Young, and Innovation Works, a technology investor that specializes in startups.

The report also found that last year the Pittsburgh region ranked 17th nationwide among the top 40 metro areas in per capita investment in tech firms.

Innovation Works CEO Rich Lunak pointed out that Pittsburgh has an advantage in its lower cost of living.

“As we compete in terms of attracting capital from investors around the nation," said Lunak, "a dollar in Pittsburgh can go a little farther than a dollar in another community like San Jose or San Francisco."

Lunak said Pittsburgh still has a ways to go to reach the level of a tech region like Austin or Seattle, as no local company has yet to reach the stature of a Snapchat or a Microsoft, and then go public.

Another of the study’s findings is that over the past 10 years, tech companies in Pittsburgh raised a total of $3.5 billion among 450 companies. Leon Hoffman of Ernst and Young said it is exciting to see so many different firms getting a slice of the pie.

“The more you see of that, the more we think...you’ll continue to see the growth of these companies in the years to come,” said Hoffman.

According to the study, a majority of local tech companies that received funding are either in software or the life sciences. The energy and industrial sector, as well as hardware and robotics firms, also made gains.

(Photo credit: brian donovan/Flickr)

Sarah Boden covers health and science for 90.5 WESA. Before coming to Pittsburgh in November 2017, she was a reporter for Iowa Public Radio. As a contributor to the NPR-Kaiser Health News Member Station Reporting Project on Health Care in the States, Sarah's print and audio reporting frequently appears on NPR and KFF Health News.