New York vs. Silicon Valley? No City Has A Lock On Innovation

The New York Times asked me to give them an opinion piece on the Mayor's effort to bring a new science and technology University to NYC. They also asked a few others, like Caterina Fake, Eric Reis, Dave Tisch, and several more students of NYC and technology. The entire discussion is here.

But the best thing I've read on this topic was not in the NY Times. It was on a blog, of course. Written by NYC's very own Chris Dixon. He nailed it.

This is what I wrote:

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The entire world is now a rival to Silicon Valley. No country, state, region, nor city has a lock on innovation in technology anymore.

The Internet has made this so, and there's no going back. We will see Apples and Facebooks get built in China, India, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and plenty of other places.

New York City has benefited enormously in the past decade from this trend. In technology, it has become the second most active start-up market in the U.S. Sadly, this is not yet true for biotech and energy tech start-ups.

Until recently, "technology" was largely about "moving electrons on wires." Now, "technology" is about building all kinds of interesting applications on top of the Internet. An increasing number of engineers and entrepreneurs are applying their ideas and energy to creating compelling services on the Internet.

Given New York City's cultural diversity, it has always attracted creative people. Amid intense global competition for innovation, it is well positioned to draw more talent.

The Bloomberg administration is wise to get behind the emerging technology sector and support it. The effort to build a world-class science and engineering campus is smart. Of course, we already have a number of great universities in the city, and these institutions are not sitting still. They are producing talented scientists and engineers in greater numbers every day.

The Bloomberg administration should also consider investing in science and engineering education in our public schools -- particularly high schools -- and the existing universities. We should be supporting what's already working here in addition to building new institutions.

This post originally appeared on AVC.com.

 

Comments

[mhyoung357]

06:46 PM on 08/07/2011

Visit Innovation Park in Tallahassee Florida!

[NYNJCTInsurance]

05:20 PM on 08/05/2011

New York is great but it's no Silicon Valley. But when it comes to restaurants and food its destroys SV.

[EcnelisDoogod]

02:30 AM on 08/05/2011

This came as a surprise when I first moved to silicon valley, but we have the best weather, especially in the summer. In the winter it never snows on the valley floor, but if you ant to go skiing, Lake Tahoe is a few hours drive away.

No amount of civic planning can create this unique and remarkably pleasant environment.

[Gottlieb]

10:55 PM on 08/04/2011

The Silicon Forest in Oregon still has the advantage of being a simple days corporate jet ride to and from the Silicon Valley. Software development is now global but the Silicon Valley still has the critical mass of talent and venture capital to be a global center of innovation. New York City and Mayor Bloomberg are going about building NYC into another global center of sustainable technology development by promoting STEM education. America needs more science, technology, engineers and math. Best wishes to NYC and I hope you are very successful since you will help all of us.