Although a relatively small share of the country’s “angel investment” deals — 5.7 percent — are done in the Great Plains, the region was just one of two (the other is the Southwest) that increased its share of them from the first half of 2011 to the first half of this year, according to a report commissioned by the Angel Resource Institute, Silicon Valley Bank and CB Insights.

Fifteen to 20 start-ups, most of them tech-related, are now established each year in eastern Nebraska, a more than threefold increase from five years ago, according to the Omaha Chamber of Commerce. Today, there is more than $300 million in organized venture capital available in the state, as well as tax credits for investors; six years ago there was virtually none, according to the chamber.

Google Fiber’s first ultrafast Internet connection drew about a dozen start-ups to a neighborhood in Kansas City, Kan. And over the past seven months, about 60 start-ups have presented their ideas in Kansas City at weekly forums organized by Nate Olson, an analyst with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. In Iowa, Startup City Des Moines, an incubator financed with $700,000 in public and private money, including a quarter-million dollars from the state, received applications from 160 start-ups over the past two years. It has accepted 9 so far.

“Traditionally, you’d say, ‘Hey, if I want the safe lifestyle, I’ll stay here and I’ll do what generations before have done,’ ” said Jeff Slobotski, an Omaha native who four years ago started Silicon Prairie News, a Web site covering the region’s tech scene. Now, he continued, “there is a newer potential in terms of what can take place here and not having to hop on the first plane out of here — saying, ‘Hey, I’m going to set up shop in the Midwest in our cities and make a go at it here.’”

Still, the region’s entrepreneurs insist that they are not striving to replicate Silicon Valley or other well-known tech hubs like Boston.