The “Force” seems to be with Boulder when it comes to notoriety as a hot spot for startups.

As the home to thriving Boulder-launched businesses such as the Techstar-spawned startup, Sphero – the creator of the Star Wars droid toy, BB-8^TM – we hear about Boulder’s vibrant startup community every day.

But now writers in two publications, Fortune Entrepreneur Insider and Business Insider, are calling Boulder the No. 2 city worldwide that might be “better than Silicon Valley” to launch your startup.

Expensiveness and competitiveness are top reasons to find another place to germinate your business, writes founder and CEO of Globelist, Mitali Rakhit in Fortune Entrepreneur Insider. She cites the cost of everything from funding to housing, food and infrastructure and the challenge of “being inside the ring with the best of the best” as reasons enough to forego the “abundance of funding and proximity to thousands of other startups” offered by Silicon Valley.

Why Boulder? An educated employment pool and lots of good company top the list, according to Business Insider and data gathered by WhoIsHostingThis.com.

The statistics reported for Boulder include:

-Nearly 70 percent of the workforce have a college degree or higher.

-The tech startup density is more than six times the national average.

-There are 242 startups and big companies – Google, Microsoft, AOL and Oracle – have made acquisitions in the area.

– Unemployment is 4.8 percent – two points below the national average.

In addition, Boulder County ranks among the top 20 most productive areas as measured by gross domestic product.

On the Business Insider list, first published by WhoIsHostingThis.com, Bangalore, India was ranked No. 1, followed by Boulder, Toronto, Cambridge-Newton-Framingham, London, Seattle-Bellevue-Everett, Tel Aviv and Santiago, Chile.

The top five alternatives to Silicon Valley named by Rakhit in Fortune’s Entrepreneur Insider are Santiago, Chile, followed by Boulder, Dubai, Omaha and Bangalore.

Infographic courtesy of WhoIsHostingThis.com .

To read the full reports, visit: http://fortune.com/2016/01/01/startup-cities-better-than-silicon-valley/and http://www.businessinsider.in/This-Is-Why-You-Shouldnt-Launch-Your-Startup-In-Silicon-Valley/articleshow/38639332.cms

To see the full infographic, visit http://www.businessinsider.in/This-Is-Why-You-Shouldnt-Launch-Your-Startup-In-Silicon-Valley/articleshow/38639332.cms .