2. METHOD
2.1. Overview of our approach To conduct this study, Startup Genome compared a number of Canadian startup ecosystems with leading North American startup ecosystems. All comparators happened to be in the US, but were selected based on their position in our Global Startup Ecosystem Ranking, rather than on the basis of pure proximity. This comparison helps to account for global market cycles that affected all ecosystems during these periods. For each ecosystem, we extracted data concerning funding rounds, from seed-stage onwards. We then aggregated this data by ‘tier’ (see below), and compared the Canadian ecosystems with the US peers. In particular, we sought to compare the proportion of startups at different stages – formation, seed, series A, etc – along with information about typical rounds. The secondary data analysis was supplemented with some primary research from key ecosystem leaders, in the form of semi-structured interviews. In undertaking most analyses, especially time to raise, we excluded life sciences startups as well as advanced manufacturing & robotics (AMR). The reason for this is that these sectors can be significantly more capital-intensive and take much longer to reach market (due to clinical trials, etc) than other digital or physical sciences startups. Thus, for a proper comparison, one would need to control for the proportion of life sciences & AMR startups in each ecosystem at different periods, which would complicate the analysis. Nevertheless, we have included some outline data concerning life sciences funding rounds. AI startups are treated separately, for reasons explained below.
We also compared the ‘attrition rate’ (that is, the decreasing proportion of startups funded at progressively later stages) at different periods over time, with particular
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