The New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) recently announced Urban Tech NYC, a program to help entrepreneurs address urgent urban issues in sectors like energy, waste, transportation, agriculture and water. It aims to provide valuable resources like space, equipment, and community to innovators. The city will invest $7.2 million dollars in Urban Tech NYC programming and construction over a ten-year period. According to the Urban Tech NYC website, the program will create up to 3,200 jobs over the next 10 years and establish “New York City as a global leader in sustainable urban innovation.”
“The rapid growth of our urban innovation sector demonstrates that building a sustainable, resilient city isn’t just smart planning ““ it’s smart economics,” said NYCEDC President Maria Torres-Springer.
The program is part of Mayor de Blasio’s OneNYC vision, which aims to increase the city’s sustainability “while promoting equity and economic growth for all New Yorkers.” Urban Tech NYC is a pioneering attempt to create new, sector-specific support to companies that have grown beyond the startup stage. It expands upon NYCEDC’s network of business incubators by adding two innovation labs, the Hub @ GCT, at Grand Central Tech, and the Hub @ New Lab, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. These new spaces will be launched in partnership with Microsoft, Cornell Tech, and Carnegie Mellon University, among others.
The new hubs will open this summer. Applications for the programs are not yet open, but interested participants can sign up for updates.
