Opportunity Knocking

Launching a solution provider business often begins with an entrepreneurial idea. But beyond that initial spark a solution provider's success can hinge on available business opportunities such as the potential customer base, access to capital, availability of state programs that aid nascent businesses, and competition from other solution providers.

This year's Best States For Millennials to Start a Solution Provider Business analysis looked at business opportunity criteria that's worth adding to the "Which State?" consideration. They include the number of businesses in a state (U.S. Census), a state's economic ranking and access to capital for economic development (CNBC America's Top States for Business 2016), Small Business Administration loans per 100,000 people in 2015 (Nerdwallet: Most Entrepreneurial States), and a state's tech sector as a percentage of total gross state product (CompTIA Cyberstates Report).

The business opportunities segment of the Best States analysis also includes solution provider competitive saturation, based on data from The Channel Company solution provider database. This ranking (with the No. 1 state having the lowest solution provider competition and No. 50 the most competition) often runs counter to the other business opportunity criteria: States with otherwise poor business opportunity scores may have fewer solution providers against which a startup would compete.

The following are the 10 states with the highest rankings for solution provider business opportunities, listed from No. 10 to No. 1. The states with the lowest rankings are then listed from No. 41 to No. 50.