Techweek New York 2014 is in the books and they’re thrilled to report that it was a big success! Here’s a quick wrap up!

By Techweek

Techweek is proud to have hosted some of New York City’s most prominent business leaders, promising startups, and disruptive technology influencers.

One of the reasons our team loves what we do is based on the inspiration we feel following each and every Techweek event. No matter how many we attend, it’s always an impactful and unique experience. This year, we had to opportunity to hear from well-known entrepreneurs and leaders including:

• Jonah Peretti (CEO, Buzzfeed)
• Reshma Saujani (CEO, Girls Who Code)
• Alexis Ohanian (Founder, Reddit)
• Shiza Shahid (Co-Founder, The Malala Fund)
• Jared Hecht (CEO, Fundera).

We also tested some uncharted waters, and we’re grateful to a lot of amazing partners for helping to make them possible, including: Michael Slaby (Managing Partner, Timshel) and Kate Woska (CEO, Atikus Insurance), who went above and beyond to help us pull together our first ever Social Innovation Summit in NYC; Brian Knappenberger, who screened and discussed his film, “The Internet’s Own Boy”; Victoria Pettibone (VP, Astia), who worked very hard to organize an Astia Venture Lunch at Techweek NY; and the Brewster team, who generously opened their office to us to welcome attendees and kick off the event.

The dust has now settled and we’ve had some time to reflect.

The Techweek mission is thriving in the NYC tech community:

Techweek, at its core, seeks to celebrate, showcase and enable innovation ecosystems, while embracing the metaphor of bringing tech communities together under a proverbial ‘big tent.’

The technology community in NYC is incredibly diverse and we, proactively, sought to engage with all members. Our speakers began discussion about women in technology, tech and ethnicity, and how to bring people from different sectors to the table. We look forward to continuing each of these conversations at all of our Techweek events in the future. We were astonished by the support and enthusiasm shown for Techweek by the greater NYC tech community and are already looking forward to returning to NYC.

The “titans of tech” are approachable, insightful, and willing to share:

Sometimes exceptional and successful people can be a bit out of reach. However, the industry leaders at Techweek were down-to-earth, inspiring, and fun. Entrepreneurial powerhouses like Alexis Ohanian (Founder, Reddit) and Will Porteous (General Partner & COO, RRE Ventures) shared business advice with our volunteers; Blake Menefee (Co-Founder, Dell Center for Entrepreneurs), Elly Bethune (Co-Founder, 9th in our FashionTECH Runway Show; and Michael Waxman (CEO, Grouper) even let attendees in on the secret of how he met his girlfriend: on a Grouper! The consensus among the Techweek team is that it felt as if we were all a group of friends – just having fun together and encouraging each other to succeed.

We want to thank everyone who was able to attend, speak, and support our mission. As the Techweek team continues to evolve, we are working tirelessly to produce events centered on innovation in technology that positively impact the business, tech, and entrepreneurial communities across the country. We look forward to the future and will see you in Los Angeles in November!

The Techweek Team