The tech sector is one of the largest and fastest-growing areas of New York’s economy. Representing hundreds of thousands of jobs and record levels of investments, NYC stands as a leading hub for homegrown startups, the most successful global companies, and the application of new technologies—including, of course, AI.
Below is our snapshot of the most recent industry datapoints and other resources on the tech ecosystem’s contributions to NYC’s overall economy.
JOBS | FUNDING | Sectors | Talent | REAL ESTATE | EDucation | Livability
SPOTLIGHT: AI IN NYC
April 2024: Empire AI was passed into law.
Empire AI is a $400 million private-public investment to make New York the national leader in AI research and development.
The Empire AI consortium:
Seven leading New York universities and research institutions to promote responsible research and opportunities focused on advancing the public good.
Columbia University
Cornell University
New York University
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
State University of New York (SUNY)
City University of New York (CUNY)
The Flatiron Institute
Empire AI builds on New York’s race to become a global hub for AI startups, applications, and talent.
New York City houses 1,035 AI-related companies, including 35 AI unicorns that have raised a total of $17B.
NYC is home to over 40,000 AI professionals
Space leased by AI companies has expanded more than 10 times over the past 10 years:
From less than 460,000 sq ft in 2014 to over 4.8M sq ft in 2024.
Two out of three New Yorkers support Empire AI.
Jobs
The NYC tech ecosystem counts for 369,000 total direct jobs – or 7% of the overall workforce.
NYC’s tech ecosystem accounted for 25% of the city’s total job growth since 2014.
Manhattan is the largest hub of tech jobs.
Between 2012-2021, Brooklyn had the largest percentage growth (42%) in tech ecosystem jobs of all the boroughs.
The number of New Yorkers in STEM-related jobs surged 67% between 2011 and 2021, reaching 323,000 – about the same number as those currently working in finance.
Tech industry employment in NYC’s five boroughs has grown 160% in the last 15 years (compared to 54% growth across the US).
NYC’s tech workforce grew by over 40% between 2019 and 2023.
One of every seven relocating workers moved to NYC, more than any other US city.
The NYC tech sector added jobs faster than nearly every other industry over the past 10 years.
17x finance and insurance sector (which increased by 8.4%)
5x advertising field (which increased by 29.7%)
3x healthcare (+46.1%)
2x film and TV sectors (+60.8%).
Funding
NYC is the second largest and second most valuable tech hub in the world.
Home to 25,000+ tech-enabled startups.
Ecosystem value $694B+.
VC funding in New York keeps rising.
$7.72B raised in Q2 2024 — a 43% increase from Q1 2024’s $5.4B.
$13.1B raised January to July 2024 — up 74% from the same point in 2023.
Manhattan is home to the most new early-stage startups in the US.
543 Manhattan-based companies raised a seed or Series A round between March 2022-23, compared to 486 in San Francisco.
In 2023, New York accounted for 15% of deals in US fundraising.
Sectors
AI and Machine Learning
Since 2019, 1,000+ AI-related companies in NYC have raised $27B in funding.
NYC is home to 40,000+ AI professionals.
AI-related job roles in NYC grew 39% from January 2023-2024 – surpassing San Francisco’s 25%.
AI deals increased by 17% in Q2 2024.
In 2024, New York State established a first-in-nation $400M+ public-private partnership to invest in AI research and development, led by the Empire AI consortium.
Fintech
In the first half of 2024 (January-June), New York fintech startups raised $2.3B in funding across 157 deals.
That’s on track to surpass the $4.7B raised in all of 2023.
New York’s share of fintech fundraising grew to 24% as a percentage of total US fundraising in 2023 (up from less than 20% in 2017).
Almost 4,000 startups in NYC — ~16% of total startups — focus on some aspect of financial services.
CLIMATE
In 2023, NYC climate startups have earned $664 million in venture or growth funding across 34 deals.
$3.5 billion in VC has flowed into New York’s climate tech sector since 2021.
More than 133,000 jobs in NYC – about 3% of all NYC jobs – have been created by green economy startups.
In 2021, the green economy directly contributed about $24 billion to NYC’s GDP.
HEALTHTECH & WELLNESS TECH
In the first half of 2024 (January - June), New York-based health tech companies raised $2.2B ($914 million in Q1, $1.3B in Q2), about 35% greater than the same period last year.
In 2023, NYC was home to a fifth of all women’s health tech deals in the US.
Talent & Workforce
Across a survey of 500 C-level executives:
99% are confident that they will be able to secure the tech skills needed from NYC’s talent pool.
59% planned to increase their number of tech hires.
75%+ of employers prioritized hiring expertise in cloud, security, and AI.
74% are using on-the-job training to reskill tech employees.
Black and Hispanic workers make up ~20% of NYC's tech workforce, double the level in San Francisco and Boston combined.
Real Estate
In 2023, NYC tech companies signed more than 1.8 million square feet in new office space.
In Q2 2024, the tech sector was responsible for 36% of all new leasing in lower Manhattan.
Tech has remained the top industry for Manhattan leasing activity for the second-straight year.
NYC is home to more than 200 co-working spaces.
Education & Training
There are more than 100 colleges and universities in NYC offering computer science and/or engineering degree programs.
Cornell Tech, the computer science and engineering graduate school on Roosevelt Island, has now incubated more than 100 startups that have gone on to amass a total $660M valuation.
467,000 New Yorkers aged 25 or older have STEM degrees.
In 2021, 29% of all NYC degrees were in STEM.
From 2011- 2021, the annual number of STEM degrees awarded in NYC increased by 61%, outpacing the national growth rate of 19%.
New York attracted 10.1% of the US’ 2023 graduating class.
The next closest market was Los Angeles, at 4.9%.
Of NYC’s 143 organizations offering ~250 job readiness programs, the tech sector represented the highest number of trainings (54 – or 18% of programs).
Fifty percent of CUNY’s enrolled STEM students are Black and/or Hispanic, and approximately 71% come from households earning less than $40,000 per year.
In 2019, a higher percentage of NYC’s girls, Black, and Latino students took an AP Computer Science exam compared to nationwide figures.
Girls: 42.2% in NYC, compared to 29.4% nationwide
Black students: 15.6%, compared to 5.7% nationwide
Latino students: 19.6%, compared to 16.6% nationwide
A 2022 poll of NYC voters found seven in 10 are in favor of government support for training programs to help people get jobs in tech (71%).
Livability
New Yorkers earning the city’s average annual wage ($86,647) could afford less than 5% of rentals on the market in 2023.
Tech workers – whose wages are higher than average ($135,089) in 2023 – could afford about one in three rentals in the city.
A 2022 poll of NYC voters found six in 10 New Yorkers believe the city should work to attract more tech companies (61%).
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