Education,

Entrepreneurship, and America’s New Immigrant

Immigration Entrepreneurs, part ii

Revealing new data about

immigrant key founders who
are fueling U.S. technology and
engineering companies
This study tracked the educational backgrounds of immigrant entrepreneurs
who were key founders of technology and engineering companies from
1995 to 2005. This study, published in June 2007, was funded by the Ewing
ip and ImmPa igration: Marion Kauffman Foundation and conducted by Duke University and the
trepreneursh
Education, EnN e w I m m i g r a n t E n t r e p r e n e u r s ,
rt II

A m e r i c a ’s University of California, Berkeley.

While the contribution of skilled immigrants to America’s technology and

engineering start-ups has been recognized for the past decade as critical to
the emergence of many of America’s most entrepreneurial companies and
huge, new industries, little has been known about the backgrounds of these
immigrant key founders.
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June 11, 2007 available at: http:
//ssrn.com/ab
Electronic copy

This study is a follow-up to a previous report that showed that in 25.3

percent of technology and engineering companies started in the United
States from 1995 to 2005, at least one key founder was foreign-born.
Nationwide, these immigrant-founded companies produced $52 billion
Download this study: in sales and employed 450,000 workers in 2005. The majority of these
www.kauffman.org/immigration immigrant key founders came from India, the United Kingdom, China,
Taiwan, Japan, and Germany.

Search for this related study Key finding: There is a strong correlation between entrepreneurship and
OUR FIN
at www.kauffman.org: educational attainment, especially in science, technology, engineering, and
mathematics (STEM).
• Intellectual Property, the Immigration Figure 2
Backlog, and a Reverse Brain-Drain: Fields of Highest Degree by Immigrant Founders of Engineering
and Technology Companies
America’s New Immigrant Entrepreneurs,
Part III

Contact:
Barbara Pruitt
816-932-1288
bpruitt@kauffman.org
Kauffman Foundation

www.kauffman.org
(over)

Comparing these data with data from the 2000

U.S. Census, we can observe that these immigrants
are also disproportionately founders of engineering
 Education, Entrepreneurship, and Immigration

• 96 percent of immigrant technology and engineering company founders held bachelor’s degrees.

• 74 percent held graduate or postgraduate degrees.

• 75 percent of the highest degrees attained were in STEM fields.

• 53 percent completed their highest degrees at U.S. universities.

Other findings:
• More than half of the foreign-born founders of U.S. technology and engineering businesses initially came to
the United States to study.

• Almost 40 percent entered the country because of a job.

• Immigrant entrepreneurs typically founded companies after working and residing in the United States for an
average of 13 years.

• Immigrant founders were educated in a diverse set of universities in both their home countries and across the
United States.

• Immigrant founders tended to move to cosmopolitan technology centers.

• Thirty-one percent of the engineering and technology companies founded from 1995 to 2005 in the 11 OUR
technology centers surveyed had an immigrant as a key founder compared with the national average of 25.3
percent.
Figure 14
• Technology centers with a Immigrant-Founded Engineering and Technology Companies
greater concentration of as Percent of Total Startups in Tech Centers
immigrant founders in their state
averages include: Silicon Valley,
52.4 percent; New York City,
43.8 percent; and Chicago, 35.8
percent.

• Three technology centers

had a below-average rate of
immigrant-founded companies:
Portland, 17.8 percent; Raleigh-
Durham’s Research Triangle Park,
18.7 percent; and Denver, 19.4
percent.

whether one or more of the company’s key localized clusters of technology and engineering
founders were immigrants. We found that, on activity in both attracting and supporting
average, 31.4 percent of the startups located in immigrant startup activity. The notable exception
these technology clusters had an immigrant key are Denver and San Diego. In both centers, a
founder, compared with the national average of significant proportion of the technology and
25.3 percent. engineering activity is related to military activities
Silicon Valley leads the nation in immigrant from which immigrants are often excluded.
entrepreneurship: 52.4 percent of its technology
v.101508
and engineering firms have immigrant
key founders. Silicon Valley is followed by
E w i n g Ma r i o n K a u f f m an F o u n d a t i o n Figure 15
New York City at 43.8 percent and Immigrant-Founded Engineering and Technology
4 8 0 1 R o c k h i l l R o a dChicago
, K an s a s C i t y, M i s s o u r i 6 4 1 1 0
at 35.8 percent. The technology in Tech Centers vs. State Averages
TEL : 8 1 6 - 9 3 2 - 1 0 0 0 wcenters
w w . kwith
a uthe
ffm a n .immigrant
lowest org key
founder presence were Denver at 19.4