Tech:NYC Digest: December 10

Tech:NYC Digest: December 10

December 10, 2021 • Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes

Friday, December 10, 2021

In today’s digest, new statewide mask mandate starts Monday, noncitizen voting bill becomes law, and our shout-out to the Tech:NYC member companies helping to improve our lives. 

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By the numbers:

  • New positive cases statewide: 11,203 

    • New positive cases, NYC: 2,120

  • NYC Positivity Rate: 2.5 percent (+0.1 percent)

  • Statewide Vaccine Progress: 

    • Percentage of adults (18+) with at least one dose: 92.3 percent

    • Percentage of total population with at least one dose: 79.9 percent 

Today’s latest: 

  • Beginning Monday, Gov. Kathy Hochul has ordered a new statewide mask mandate for all indoor public places in New York, unless businesses or venues implement a vaccine requirement. 

    • In NYC, there aren’t likely to be noticeable changes, since “Key to NYC” policies already require proof of vaccination. The decision to reinstate the mandate statewide was based on consistently high positivity rates and increasing hospitalizations largely in upstate counties. (Associated Press)

    • The measure is effective until Jan. 15, 2022, at which time it will be re-evaluated. (ABC New York)

  • Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the state administered more than 500,000 booster shots this week amid threats of the Omicron variant, nearly doubling the previous week's number. (CNBC)

  • Nearly a million noncitizens residing in NYC will now be eligible to vote in municipal elections under legislation passed by the City Council on Thursday. (POLITICO)

    • The measure makes New York the largest city in the country to allow legal residents to participate in citywide elections.

  • And here’s the official route for SantaCon tomorrow — mostly so you know which places to avoid. (And by the way, a 15-year-old New Yorker put together ElfCon, a kid-friendly hot cocoa crawl as a very cute alternative.)

In other reading:

Today, we wanted to use this space to give a shout-out to some of the work being achieved by Tech:NYC member companies — each is an example of how startups can be broader partners to the places where they’re building. We’re a little biased, but for these projects, that place is NYC.

Via, which you may know from their rideshare app, is branching out to offer its tools for other modes of mobility, like school buses. (Axios)

  • The company’s latest project is a partnership with NYC to equip school buses with GPS-based systems that track students’ bus rides, giving parents the peace of mind of knowing where their child is in real-time.

  • Daniel Ramot, co-founder and CEO of Via, says this type of student tracking is long overdue: "You can track your pizza from the moment it leaves the oven, but you can't track where your bus is."

  • It’s also building in technologies that identify the most efficient routes for those buses, a component that could circumvent — and actually help alleviate — traffic and congestion issues.

The partnership is one of more than 500 other projects with cities and transit agencies all over the world, and fresh off closing another $130 million in new venture funding, it’s quickly becoming the leader in public mobility.

Propel is helping make safety net programs easier to use through a free app. (New York Times)

  • The app, Providers, was originally launched with just $11,000 in Kickstarter contributions. It now provides five million households with the tools they need to access and easily manage their SNAP benefits.

  • “Too much bureaucracy prevents people from getting the help they need,” said Propel founder and CEO Jimmy Chen. “For someone like me, a phone is like a magic wand. If I want to call a cab, there’s an app; if I want to book a hotel, there’s an app; if I want to get a date, there’s an app. It’s just incredibly unfair that we don’t apply more of this sophisticated knowledge to the problems of lower-income Americans.”

During the pandemic, Propel has also partnered with the charity Give Directly to distribute $180 million to its users, and it’s expanding to offer accounts that can receive paychecks and other government benefits. 

And one more favorite project: Girls Who Code partnered with Doja Cat to debut the first-ever codable music video. “Woman” was dropped online as a living, interactive experience. (The Verge)

  • You can try out the experience for yourself at Dojacode.com.

In other reading:

  • After Covid Closures, a New Quest to Make Offices Less Awful (Wall Street Journal)

  • 8 Ways to Make Going Back to the Office Less Stressful (TIME)

  • An Employee Wants to Bring a Fired Co-Worker to the Holiday Party, And Three Other Tricky Workplace Dilemmas (Inc.)

  • Authoritive, a New York City-based marketing solution developer for experts and creators, raised $5 million in seed funding led by Owl Ventures and was joined by Guardian Media Ventures. (PR Newswire)

  • Deed, a New York City-based workplace giving platform, raised $10 million in Series A funding. Earlybird led the round and was joined by PruVen Capital, Y Combinator, and Paua Ventures. (TechCrunch)

  • GoCoach, a New York City-based workplace learning and coaching platform, raised $3.5 million in seed funding. Panoramic Ventures led the round and was joined by Early Light Ventures, Zane Capital, WGU Labs, RevUp Capital, Gaingels, Ben Franklin Technology Partners, and Global Super Angels Fund. (FinSMEs)

  • HelloHero, a New York City-based online therapy and mental health company, raised $7.7 million in seed funding. Silverton Partners led the round and was joined by Correlation Ventures, Achieve Partners, and Service Provider Capital New England Fund. (TechCrunch)

  • Paradigm, a New York City-based crypto derivatives firm, raised $35 million in Series A funding. Jump Capital and Alameda Ventures co-led the round and were joined by Genesis Trading, QCP Capital, Nexo, and Optiver US, among others. (CoinDesk)

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