New York City is vying to become the global capital of AI, leveraging its strengths in finance, communications and media, law, and medicine.
Tech Week NYC, a 370-event showcase coordinated by Andreessen Horowitz, will kick off on October 16. Among the events are AI speed dating and Latino startup mixers.
Asana CIO Saket Srivastava says companies feel the need to talk to customers more with something as big as generative AI. Julie Samuels, president and executive director of Tech:NYC, says founders flock to the city because it’s the best place to apply, monetize, and scale the transformational AI tech they’ve built.
A growing number of tech companies are opening and expanding offices and hosting major events in New York. In the last month alone, Microsoft debuted its full Copilot product, Google delivered its annual Made By Google hardware event, and LinkedIn presented its AI vision. Dropbox, Asana, Zendesk, and Cockroach Labs also held major events. Researchers gathered for the Virtual Human Global Summit, and the United Nations General Assembly prompted global AI hand-wringing.
Since 2021, tech money and jobs have flooded into the city. Leading VC firms including Sequoia, Index, and Andreessen Horowitz opened offices. AlleyCorp shelled out $41M in 2022 for a six-story building to house its startups. Even Amazon is having a New York revival, expanding into an iconic 600,000 square foot Fifth Avenue building, four years after nixing a second headquarters in the city amid a pressure campaign led by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Still, the Bay Area remains far ahead of New York as a hub for tech employment, startups, and investment.
The sources for this piece include an article in Axios.