The top ten cities to nurture biotech growth.

To create the best environment to promote an expanding successful biotech sector in a city or town near you requires, according to GEN, two things: capital and talent. Boston and San Francisco remain #1 and #2 of the Top 10 U.S. Biopharma Clusters, possessing what Atlas Venture VC analyst Bruce Booth characterized as the right “pixie dust” to promote a successful cluster.

For three years running, Boston/Cambridge and the San Francisco Bay area have held the top spots; however, the eight others, said the report, possess significant assets that make them winners with researchers, the C-suite and most importantly investors.

Rankings were based on five criteria including NIH funding, Venture Capital funding, the number of patents since 1976 (in namesake cities where companies are located) and the total square footage of lab space based on total-size-of-market figures.

Based on those data sets, GEN offered the following ranking for the country’s Top 10 Biopharma Clusters:

1. Boston/Cambridge

2. San Francisco/Bay Area

3. New York/New Jersey

4. San Diego

5. Maryland/Virginia/DC Metro

6. Greater Philadelphia

7. Seattle

8. Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina

9. Los Angeles/Orange County

10. Chicago