Tech:NYC Digest: August 22

Tech:NYC Digest: August 22

August 22, 2023 • Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

Tuesday, August 22, 2023

In today’s digest, NYC’s plan to expand pedestrian space, what to know about the late summer COVID surge, and BBG Ventures’ roadmap for funding underrepresented founders. 

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  • An expansion of NYC’s “Broadway Vision” plan is underway to connect the Flatiron District to Union Square through dedicated public spaces for pedestrians and cyclists. (Gothamist)

    • The project’s public outreach efforts are underway to meet with residents — you can find Dept. of Transportation representatives collecting feedback along Broadway between Union Square and East 21st Street tomorrow and Friday. 

  • COVID cases in NYC have been steadily increasing since July, according to the most recent data from the Dept. of Health. (New York Times)

    • The seven-day average of total cases, which includes confirmed and probable cases, was 672 on Aug. 14, compared to 289 on May 16.

    • As a reminder: There are more than 200 pickup sites where New Yorkers (regardless of immigration status) can get free tests. Plus, make sure to check the expiration dates of at-home rapid tests, as expired tests can yield inaccurate results.

In other reading:

  • Rockefeller Center will have its own tennis court during the US Open (TimeOut New York)

  • Fireflies may disappear, so New York scientists are trying to count how many are left (Gothamist)

We’re not breaking news here to say that progress on funding diverse founders remains slow.

  • In 2022, women-led companies received 1.9% of VC dollars, and Black-founded companies received just 1% of VC funding. These numbers feel most acute to early-stage founders planning their first rounds of investment.

What’s new: Out of 5,985 US-based VC firms investing at the seed stage, fewer than 45 made at least half of their investments in women- and BIPOC-led companies, without an explicit mandate to do so, according to new data from Tech:NYC member BBG Ventures. 

  • 111 of these firms — just 5% of US-based seed funds — that are actively making half of their investments into diverse founders either (1) have explicit criteria to do so, or (2) are firms overwhelmingly led by general partners who are women and/or people or color.

BBG Ventures’ head of platform Amber Quiñones told Fortune: “We can’t meaningfully change the outcomes of venture capital at the exits if we’re not meaningfully changing the inputs at the early stage."

In other reading:

  • How to Make a Résumé Interviewers Actually Want to Read (New York Magazine)

  • The overlooked hybrid structure: One week in the office per month (WorkLife)

  • Try these 5 strategies to attract candidates who are joyful and productive (Fast Company)

  • Elemental Cognition, a NYC-based generative AI company, raised $60 million in Series B funding. Participating investors include Bridgewater Associates, Breyer Capital, AME Cloud Ventures, and Staged Ventures, and others.

  • Teamshares, a Brooklyn-based employee ownership platform for small businesses, raised $124 million in Series D funding. QED Investors led the round and was joined by Inspired Capital, Khosla Ventures, Slow Ventures, Spark Capital, and Union Square Ventures.

  • August 23: In-person: State of the Fintech Market: Latest Trends in Funding, with Vesey Ventures founding partner Julia Huang, Foundation Capital partner Nico Stainfeld, Barclays investor Aran Rudrakumar, and Illuminate Financial investment executive Charlton Hook. Hosted by Rise by Barclays. Register here.

  • August 23: In-person: How to Leverage AI to Grow Your Software Company, with Merge CTO Gil Feig, Replit growth engineer Gian Segato, MongoDB lead vector search product manager Benjamin Flast, and Ansa investor Josh Chin. Hosted by Ansa Capital. Register here.

  • September 12: In-person: Entrepreneurs Roundtable, with Eniac Ventures co-founder and general partner Hadley Harris. Hosted by ERA. Register here.

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