How come NY doesn't have a homegrown brand name tech giant? (New York: real estate market, credit)
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With supposedly so much talent and a large workforce, how come NY tech companies never get big and globally recognizable like Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, etc.?
Even Seattle's (just a little bigger than Staten Island) got those two giants!
Since the OP placed this thread in the NYC forum, then it seems the OP is looking at NYC itself. IBM corporate headquarters moved to Upstate NY. NYC has had research tech grants for decades, but the parts of tech that needed tech campuses have been in Upstate NY, NJ and the Island. NYC strengths are financial, media and fashion.
IBM's headquarters is in Armonk, NY, in WESTCHESTER not upstate.
And actually tech companies these days do indeed have NYC campuses. Uber's NYC campus (it's a social app that let's you call taxis) is in LONG ISLAND CITY in Queens. Google owns the Port Authority building in Chelsea. Amazon and Facebook have presences too.
For the manufacturing of electronic devices, including servers, much of that is in China or Asia these days (Though you do have semiconductor manufacturing in the US, including in upstate NY). But a big part of tech these days is social media applications or cloud computing. That is indeed done in NYC itself. So NYC's current strengths include tech.
More science than computer science, NJ does have Bell Labs.
Or whats left of it. I think since the big phone company breakup they all became separate companies. There is that big building and campus up in Murray Hill NJ by Berkeley Heights and some other smaller buildings by Livingston but I think its called something else like Alcatel,,,Alcatel-Lucent it is now.
The real big former Bell Labs in Holmdel has been reinventing itself for a while and I think is farming itself out as techy office space lately...
I think the pool of tech talent and tech venture funding is just better out west. The tech industry in NYC was for a very long time centered around the financial industry. What tech had started up out here was more focused around media content. This seems to be changing now.
Different mindsets, financial institutions are not known for pushing and investing disruptive and innovative technology. They are only interested in technology that runs their businesses and cut costs for them through automation and job killing. What major company in the East Coast has rolled out a technological innovation? The only thing comes out of here are corporate and patent lawsuits and business reorganizations.
You go to any venture capitalist on the East Coast they are looking for technology that creates marketshare so they can see their quick bucks. They have no patience for stuff like nanotech, biotech, or battery tech. Which is why you'll never find companies like Tesla. I used to work for a venture capitalist company in NYC and they are goddam backward thinking people or you call them traditionalist. There's no progress here for Tech unless people become more forward thinking.
These are people that hated the idea of the iPhones when it was announced typing in their Blackberries but now are all iPhone addicts.
West coast is where you have technology that targets all industries.
Heh, this may be the best answer and its likely that NY cant be number one at everything. It would be like asking this question decades back on why Detroit has all the automotive companies. At one point the NYC area had a significant presence, with Bell Labs, IBM and that just waned over time. But outside all flavors of Finance, NYC area has a significant holds in Media, Law, Fashion and Pharmaceuticals and you'll find a lot of congolomerates.
I think the pool of tech talent and tech venture funding is just better out west. The tech industry in NYC was for a very long time centered around the financial industry. What tech had started up out here was more focused around media content. This seems to be changing now.
I'd say a large part of NYC's growing tech industry is still media related. Facebook, Google, Amazon, Yahoo/Tumblr are all media as well as tech companies. Social media applications like ZocDoc (used to make medical appointments on your smartphone) are media related too.
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