Location rather than prestige driving big tech hiring

Resume builder Resume Genius has released new research mapping which US colleges feed Big Tech and frontier AI companies. The findings suggest that where a university is located and how it connects to employers’ matter more than its position in national rankings.

Using LinkedIn alumni data, Resume Genius examined the MANGO group of key tech companies (Microsoft, Apple, Nvidia, Google, OpenAI) – plus Meta and Anthropic – and compared their hiring patterns against Forbes’s Top 50 U.S. colleges. Across companies, the data shows a consistent pattern: universities embedded in strong tech ecosystems, with comprehensive employer partnerships, tend to send a larger share of graduates into high-profile tech roles than many more prestigious but less-connected institutions.

The top schools by alumni share who’ve worked at MANGO companies in our report are:

• Carnegie Mellon University (PA): 6.88%
• Georgia Tech (GA): 3.48%
• Caltech (CA): 3.42%
• Stanford (CA): 3.12%
• University of Washington (WA): 2.57%

Microsoft

Top 5 feeder schools (by % of total alumni body):

• University of Washington (~1.41%)
• Carnegie Mellon University (~0.97%)
• Georgia Tech (~0.92%)
• Caltech (~0.42%)
• Stanford University (~0.34%)

Meta

Top 5 feeder schools (by % of total alumni body):

• Carnegie Mellon University (~1.36%)
• Georgia Tech (~0.60%)
• Caltech (~0.50%)
• Stanford University (~0.45%)
• University of California, Berkeley (~0.41%)

Apple

Top 5 feeder schools (by % of total alumni body):

• Carnegie Mellon University (~1.15%)
• Caltech (~0.72%)
• Stanford University (~0.71%)
• Georgia Tech (~0.63%)
• UC San Diego (~0.54%)

Nvidia

Top 5 feeder schools (by % of total alumni body):

• Carnegie Mellon University (~0.55%)
• Caltech (~0.34%)
• Stanford University (~0.27%)
• Georgia Institute of Technology (~0.26%)
• University of Southern California (~0.20%)

Google

Top 5 feeder schools (by % of total alumni body)

• Carnegie Mellon University (~2.62%)
• Caltech (~1.28%)
• Stanford University (~1.18%)
• Georgia Institute of Technology (~1.02%)
• University of California, Berkeley (~0.90%)

Additional takeaways

1. Geography plays a major role in big tech graduate hiring

Across the companies studied, geography plays a major role in shaping hiring patterns. Universities located in established or emerging tech hubs – including Seattle, the Bay Area, Pittsburgh and Southern California – tend to place a disproportionate share of their graduates into nearby employers. For example, 1.41% of University of Washington alumni have worked at Microsoft, compared to just 0.34% from Stanford –  that’s almost 5x higher for a school located 46 places further down the Forbes rankings.

These effects are often reinforced by:

• Joint research centres and labs hosted on or near campus
• Co-branded programmes where company engineers teach or co-design courses
• Regular on-campus recruiting and internships that run throughout the year, not just during the summer

“When a campus and a company share a city, a building or even a lab, students get used to seeing how their work fits into real products and services,” said Ed Huang, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Resume Genius and Carnegie Mellon alumnus. “That’s true in Pittsburgh, but you can see the same pattern in places like Seattle, the Bay Area, and San Diego.”

2. Carnegie Mellon stands out for big tech hiring

Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) emerges in the report as one of the most consistent feeder schools across Big Tech and frontier AI. It appears at or near the top of the rankings for all companies in our data, despite ranking below other top technical institutions in traditional league tables. Here’s how CMU ranks for alumni share at top Big Tech companies in the Bay Area, compared to Stanford:

1 for Meta: 1.36% vs 0.45% Stanford

1 for Apple: 1.15% vs 0.71% Stanford

1 for Nvidia: 0.55% vs 0.27% Stanford

1 for Google: 2.62% vs 1.18% Stanford

This shows that CMU breaks the trend of geography being a key factor, dominating the share of its alumni working at MANGO companies even when top schools such as Stanford and UC Berkeley are located in Big Tech’s backyard.

CMU’s position reflects decades of investment in industry links, research centres, and co-located labs, including long-running collaborations with major tech firms. These partnerships give students regular exposure to employer-style projects, tools and expectations, and create a steady pipeline of internships and graduate hires.

“What stood out to me at Carnegie Mellon wasn’t only academic prestige, but also the atmosphere and the people,” said Ed Huang, co-founder of Resume Genius and a Carnegie Mellon graduate. “You’re surrounded by ambitious, motivated classmates, working on real-life projects with real companies throughout the curriculum. It builds a mindset that’s much closer to how problems are tackled in the tech world than in a traditional classroom.”

CMU is an example of a broader trend, rather than purely being an outlier:

• In the Pacific Northwest, the University of Washington benefits from its proximity and deep ties to Microsoft and other local employers.
• In California, UC Berkeley, Stanford, UC San Diego and Caltech all show strong pipelines into nearby tech giants, reflecting the density of engineering teams and research hubs in the Bay Area and Southern California.
• In the Southeast, Georgia Tech’s close connections to industry in Atlanta and beyond translate into above-average representation at multiple Big Tech employers.

In each case, universities gain an advantage not solely through brand recognition, but by sitting inside an active tech ecosystem and building long-term relationships with companies that hire their graduates.

3. Public flagships and tech-focused schools often beat the Ivy League

Resume Genius’ analysis shows that Ivy League schools are visible but not dominant in Big Tech and AI hiring. Instead, public flagships and specialised technical universities frequently outrank more traditionally prestigious institutions when hiring is measured by the share of alumni working for specific tech companies.

These schools benefit from excellent technical programmes and strong locations, but also from decades of deliberate effort to build relationships with employers, ranging from collaborative research to dedicated talent programmes.

4. Frontier AI hiring is highly concentrated

When the analysis focuses on frontier AI companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic, the report finds that hiring is even more concentrated. A relatively small cluster of universities – including Stanford, UC Berkeley, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, and Harvard – account for a large share of alumni working at these firms.

Many of these institutions have:

• Long-established AI and machine learning research groups
• Direct partnerships or funding initiatives with AI labs
• Faculty and alumni who move regularly between academia and industry

While frontier AI firms do hire from a broader range of schools, the study suggests that early access to research, compute power, and specialised courses continues to be heavily tied to a small number of campuses.

5. Choosing a University for Big Tech Careers

For students choosing where to study, the report suggests looking beyond headline rankings and asking practical questions about ecosystems and employer links:

• Which companies are consistently present on campus?
• What kinds of projects do students complete with external partners?
• How many graduates actually end up working in the industries they care about – and where are those companies based?

“Rankings tell you something, but they don’t tell you everything,” Huang said. “If you’re serious about working in Big Tech, it’s worth looking into who your university works with, what kinds of problems you’ll be solving, and where graduates end up. Those details say more about your future day-to-day reality than a single number on a list.”