Leading Cities and QBE Announce 2025 Top 100 Smart City Startups Advancing Urban Resilience

Global innovators selected from 820+ applicants to join QBE AcceliCITY Resilience Challenge, tackling the world’s most urgent urban challenges.

Leading Cities and the QBE Foundation proudly announce the Top 100 semi-finalists for the 2025 QBE AcceliCITY Resilience Challenge, a global accelerator now in its seventh year designed to identify and scale innovative solutions that build more resilient, sustainable, and equitable cities.

This year’s Top 100 startups were selected from a record-breaking 820+ applications representing 71 countries across six continents. Each of these ventures is pioneering a technology or solution with the potential to transform urban systems and strengthen communities against the growing impacts of climate change, economic volatility, and social disruption.

As cities worldwide face unprecedented pressures, from extreme weather to aging infrastructure and widening inequality, this year’s cohort reflects a powerful surge of entrepreneurial momentum and urgency. Notably, 49.56% of the selected companies include one or more female founders, continuing the program’s commitment to elevating diverse leadership in climate and urban innovation.

“Every year, the QBE AcceliCITY Resilience Challenge proves that the solutions to our greatest challenges already exist—we just need to get them into the right hands,” said Michael Lake, President and CEO of Leading Cities. “This year’s applicants showed extraordinary vision, but what sets the Top 100 apart is their boldness. These founders aren’t just thinking about product-market fit—they’re thinking about planetary fit. And that’s exactly what we need right now.”

Since its inception, AcceliCITY has become one of the top GovTech accelerators in the world, connecting entrepreneurs with city leaders, industry experts, and funding opportunities. It culminates in the awarding of a $100,000 non-equity grand prize, along with $25,000 prizes for runners-up, enabling the most promising innovations to be piloted in communities around the globe.

In addition to the primary Smart City Challenge, one specialized challenge is also part of this year’s program. Working closely with QBE Insurance, the PropTech Challenge targets loss mitigation solutions that identify or minimize potential hazards more quickly, lessen the effects of property damage, decrease business disruption or home evacuation caused by property damage, and offer innovative responses to challenges at the intersection of commercial property insurance and sustainability. 

Meanwhile, the launch of a separate initiative—the QBE Humanitarian AcceliCITY Challenge—marks a significant evolution of AcceliCITY’s global growth. Now launched as a standalone challenge, the Humanitarian AcceliCITY Challenge opens in September 2025 and focuses on solutions that enable global communities to adapt to climate-related impacts. Delivered by Australian Red Cross Humanitech in collaboration with the Global Disaster Preparedness Centre and supported by the American Red Cross and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the track invites participants to address a real-world climate resilience problem identified by the Australian Red Cross. This initiative reflects a deep commitment to equitable access, ethical innovation, and GDPR-compliant data practices—ensuring that the most vulnerable communities are not only protected, but prioritized.

In a powerful kickoff to the 2025 cohort, Danny Wright, founder of Gravity Water and winner of the 2024 Challenge, addressed this year’s Top 100. Wright shared his team’s journey deploying rainwater harvesting systems in schools across Southeast Asia and the United States, emphasizing the critical role of participation and passion in the program.

“You’ve already won by being part of this community,” Wright told the cohort. “But I challenge every one of you to show up fully. Engage with the mentors, dig into the curriculum, and think bigger than your current market. These challenges are global... and your solutions can be too.”

In the weeks ahead, the Top 100 companies will participate in a rigorous, certified online curriculum, gaining tools to refine their business models and navigate the complexities of working with government. They’ll also connect directly with city officials and industry leaders through Leading Cities’ LaunchPad 11 network, building relationships that often lead to real-world pilots.

AcceliCITY continues to serve as a platform for scaling impact—where urban innovators don’t just pitch, they implement. With past pilot projects launched on four continents, the program remains laser-focused on turning ideas into action.

“If we could give $100,000 to every one of these companies, we would,” said Lake. “But what we offer goes beyond funding. We offer access—access to the right conversations, the right partners, and the right cities to bring sustainable solutions to life.”

The 2025 cohort is a testament to the growing global movement of mission-driven entrepreneurs building a more resilient future. At a time when the world urgently needs bold solutions, these Top 100 startups stand ready to lead the way. 

Discover the 2025 Top 100 Resilience Solutions here.