In May of 2021, Balaji Srinivasan, author of The Network State, described and divided “startup cities” into three groups. Balaji pointed out that no worldwide or industry consensus exists on how to define a startup city, especially considering that they can encompass many different focuses.

As the startup city movement grows and new projects continue to emerge, the Adrianople Group decided to create a tool that visualize the progress.

This is how the Startup Cities Map was born.