NYC Poised to Become the Capital of Blockchain and Other Emerging Tech Industries

For the first time ever, New York City sponsored the launch of Blockchain Week, which joined Fashion Week and Internet Week as one of the city’s trumpeted industry week-long gatherings. It accompanied the announcement of a blockchain resource center, a venue for events and businesses, as well as a public blockchain competition. It not only signals mainstream interest of the underlying technology that powers cryptocurrencies, but more importantly, it hints at the emerging industries of the future as the economic waves begin to ripple.

The tech sector in New York City has become its tower of strength. New York’s tech sector is still ascendant, locking in its place as the second largest tech hub behind Silicon Valley. Its core economic engines—its legacy industries—have not been so much replaced by tech as they have been tethered to it. The tech industry has added more jobs than any other in the city: 47,000 in the last decade.

But what’s on the economic horizon isn’t just nondescriptly “tech”—it’s biotech, real estate tech, and now, like wildfire, emerging technology such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, and augmented and virtual reality.