Indian, Chinese entrepreneurs rising in US

Indian and Chinese entrepreneurs bucked the trend of falling immigrant-founded technology companies in the United States, a new study reveals.

Released Tuesday, the study conducted by Kauffman Foundation found that about 33.2 percent of co-founders of engineering and technology companies in the country over the last six years were Indians. This number increased 7 percent from a similar study examining companies founded by immigrants between 1995 to 2005, it noted.

Chinese immigrants also showed an increase of 8.1 percent, compared to the 6.9 percent in 2005, the study added.

The study surveyed 1,882 companies out of 107,819 engineering and tech companies founded in the U.S. in the last six years, although the actual timeframe was not stated.

The increase from this two population groups were in contrast with the overall number of companies started by immigrants, which dropped to 24.3 percent from 25.3 percent in 2005. This drop was more evident in Silicon Valley, the hotbed of U.S. tech innovation, where the percentage of startups founded by immigrants fell from 52.4 percent to 43.9 percent, it noted.

Rounding up the top 5 immigrant populations contributing most to the number of technology startups were the U.K. at 6.3 percent, Canada at 4.2 percent, and Germany at 3.9 percent.