May 18 2017 | South Florida is No. 1 in the U.S. for new startup activity, study shows

Step aside, Austin, Texas. Startup activity is bigger in Miami.

So says the Kauffman Foundation’s 2017 Index of Startup Activity, which measures new business creation. The Miami-Fort Lauderdale area ranked No. 1 among the 40 largest metro areas in the U.S., after two years of following Austin, the report released Thursday showed. The Kauffman Foundation, based in Kansas City, develops and funds global research and programs in entrepreneurship.

For the annual ranking, Kauffman’s analysts parsed government data from 2016 to determine the rate of entrepreneurs opening businesses in any given month, including the self-employed, and whether they are starting businesses because of the market opportunity rather than out of necessity. The index also measure startup density, or the number of newly created businesses that employ at least one other person per 1,000 companies.