Today, we’re excited to announce three new hires have joined the Tech:NYC team: former New York City Council Member Marjorie Velázquez as the organization’s Vice President of Policy, former Adams Administration Senior Policy Advisor Lisi McCall as Chief of Staff, and Bryan Lozano, formerly of Empire State Development, as Director of the Tech:NYC Foundation. Sarah Brown, the organization’s founding Chief of Staff, will be moving into the role of Chief Strategy Officer. 

Tech:NYC issued the following statement in response to today’s 2024 State of the State address by Governor Kathy Hochul:

“I one hundred percent believe that the solutions to the climate crisis are inextricably woven with solutions to wealth equality,” says Donnel Baird, the founder and CEO of BlocPower. The startup, which was founded in 2014, sources and implements sustainable building upgrades. But simply greening buildings is just the beginning of that work.

To close out the year, we asked New York tech leaders in our network: What’s one book you read in 2023 that had an impact on you?

As we close out a challenging year for venture activity, early-stage founders are looking ahead to what 2024 will bring. Will it be a bounce-back year for dealflow?

Last week, the Tech:NYC team — with a crew of startup founders and other leaders in our member network — traveled to the annual SOMOS conference in Puerto Rico, where we spent some time connecting with a broad coalition of other organizations on how to support Latino communities, here in New York and in Puerto Rico.

If you’re like us, you’re still riding the adrenaline (or perhaps still recovering) from the whirlwind of events during New York Tech Week — more than 420 of them made it the largest Tech Week in any city to date! But a real highlight for us was all the founders we met at the Tech:NYC Founder House.

More than 400 events. Tens of thousands of attendees. A hustle that won’t quit. That’s New York tech.

Last week, alongside our friends at a16z and dozens of Tech:NYC member companies, we were proud to kick off the largest Tech Week to date. The idea was simple: We set out to celebrate New York and the startups that call it home.