Tory heads to N.Y. on tech mission
Mayor on board to create an ‘East Coast alliance’
Silicon Valley comes to mind when most people think about tech companies, but a group of East Coast startups in Toronto and New York City are trying to change that.
Mayor John Tory is on board with the mission to create an “East Coast alliance” between the two cities, and will visit New York City on Tuesday to meet with startup executives at Grand Central Tech, an innovation hub in the Big Apple, in collaboration with Toronto’s MaRS Discovery District.
Tory will participate in roundtable discussions with executives such as Michael Katchen, CEO of Wealth- simple, a Toronto investment management firm that targets millennials, and Jonathan Libov, director of product at Figure 1, a Toronto-based social network for health-care professionals.
“We’re obviously in close proximity to New York, and there’s benefits for both sides,” said Dessy Daskalov, chief technology officer of Nudge Rewards, an app that connects the nonoffice employees of companies with front office information.
“Toronto’s a great place to get your start . . . but obviously the market south of us is much larger,” she said.
The mayor’s two-day trip will also include a visit to Sidewalk Labs, the city-building arm of Google that is set to develop a “smart city,” known as Quayside, on Toronto’s eastern waterfront.
Tory will also co-host a “Tech in Toronto” reception to promote the city’s tech community.
The mayors of Brampton and Mississauga and the regional chairs of Durham and York will join Tory at an event for Toronto Global, an organization launched in February to attract foreign investment, such as New York tech firms, to the GTA.
While East Coast tech firms don’t have the clout of West Coast internet giants such as Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Amazon, Toronto has gained a reputation for top-notch “fintech,” or financial technology, said Kirk Simpson, CEO of Wave, a company that creates software for small businesses.