The province of Alicante has seen its percentage of tech employment grow, thanks to a university and talent base that fuels its innovation system. However, data from the Cotec Yearbook 2026 reveals that the territory is still far from the main Spanish tech hubs. Specifically, the weight of technology-intensive employment in the city of Alicante stands at 4.52%.
This figure places Alicante below other cities such as Valencia (6.18%), Málaga (6.04%), Seville (7.89%), Madrid (10.23%), and Barcelona (12.43%). Vigo leads the comparison with 13.08%. The 4.52% in the Alicantinian capital reflects the provincial trend, where the 2026 Map of Technological Employment in Spain placed the weight of these activities at 3.6% of total employment, compared to the state average of 6.9%. This indicates that the city has higher technological intensity than the province as a whole, although it remains below many important urban centers in the country.
Despite this gap, the absolute evolution is positive. Between 2024 and 2025, 1,295 new tech affiliates were incorporated in the province, and the weight of this type of employment has also increased over the last decade. However, this progress has not been enough to bring the Alicantinian productive structure closer to the Spanish average. The contrast is even more evident within the Valencian Community, where Valencia registers 7.3% tech employment, almost double that of Alicante's 3.6%. Nationally, between 2015 and 2025, the growth in tech employment was 45.8%, with Madrid and Catalonia accounting for more than half of the new jobs.
Tech employment tends to concentrate around large urban centers and established business and research ecosystems, such as Barcelona and Madrid. The report also points to a relationship between Next Generation funds linked to R&D+i and the increase in this employment in recipient municipalities. The Alicantinian province has increased the number of tech workers in cities like Elche and Alicante, especially in programming and consulting, although this expansion still represents a limited fraction of the overall labor market.
Cotec's Local Innovation Index places Alicante in 28th position out of 59 Spanish functional areas, with a score of 4.04, dropping nine places since 2022. The index, which considers 16 variables grouped into five axes (investment, education, research, employment, and business), shows Alicantinian strengths and weaknesses. In education and talent, it scores 4.96 points, with 5.84 doctoral theses and 42.63 graduates per 10,000 inhabitants. In contrast, in investment and financing, the score drops to 1.59.
Despite lower resources, Alicante is considered an "attractive" area with high relative efficiency, converting investment and human capital into innovation results, along with other territories such as Arona, Málaga, Palma, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, and Tarragona. In European funding, Alicante registers 15,480 euros per 10,000 inhabitants, less than Benidorm (31,000 euros). National leadership in innovation is shared among Salamanca, Murcia, Madrid, Bilbao, Barcelona, Zaragoza, Pamplona, Vigo, and San Sebastián.
The Valencian Community, in general, has improved its innovation indicators, incorporating 638 new R&D affiliates between July 2024 and July 2025 (a 6.1% year-on-year increase), surpassing the growth of Catalonia, Madrid, and Andalusia. The region has entered the group of "strong innovators" among European regions. However, challenges remain in business collaboration, SME innovation, and the transformation of knowledge into economic results. At the Spanish level, investment in R&D continues to increase, with 125,107 R&D affiliates as of August 2025.
