Leeds is ready to surf second wave of tech growth: Steve Harris

At the same time, venture capital investment into Leeds startups grew by 88 per cent last year, which is a really important indicator of the city’s attractiveness as a place to invest and the quality of the businesses in the city.

That’s in no small part down to the supportive, collaborative digital community.

Entrepreneurs in the city back each other, with established players sharing advice and encouragement with up-and-comers.

There’s an advanced infrastructure to support this process, including Lloyds Bank, Leeds City Council, and the high-quality advisory community.

It’s very telling that there are more than 70 tech sector networks – some formal, some less so – that regularly meet across the city to share their insights and experiences.

And then you can add events such as Leeds Digital Festival and Climb 23 that not only support what is already in Leeds but attracts a much wider interested audience.

And because Leeds is an attractive place to develop a tech business, investors want to be here too.

A particular strength of Leeds’ technology sector is the application of data.

High quality data is fundamental to the future of artificial intelligence, which presents a real market opportunity for tech businesses in Leeds.

The city has a longstanding strength in professional services, financial services and healthcare; all sectors that generate huge amounts of data and where the application of artificial intelligence holds enormous potential.