Last month I wrote that the New York State Business Plan Competition that has been held since it started in Albany was in jeopardy. Thankfully, NYBPC was permitted to use the ZEN Building at SUNY PI, its traditional home and it was its usual success.
Besides the regional startup tech competition to select eligible participants in the NYBPC, the BlackstoneLab held its third annual competition at the University at Albany. These kinds of events stimulate students to become interested in doing a startup project and hopefully we will be seeing the birth of major successes like CommerceHub founded by its CEO, Frank Poore and located on the top floor of the ZEN Building. Poore’s company recently was valued at $1 billion dollars and like Kitware, founded 20 years ago by Lisa Avilia who is still CEO. Kitware is now building a new office building in this area and has offices in a number of countries. They are the kinds of successes you can learn about by attending the monthly entrepreneurial Luncheons sponsored by the BizLab and the Clarkson Business School in Schenectady.
In addition, Governor Cuomo announced 6 winners in the 4th round of the NYS Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) partnership awards. These newly awarded public-private educational partnerships add to the growing number of NY high school students currently preparing for high-skill jobs in technology, manufacturing and health-care related fields. Students will earn an associate degree at no cost to their families and will be first in line for jobs with participating companies when they graduate. The 6 new partnerships in the Capital Region are Watervliet CSD and Capital Region BOCES. The higher ed partners are HVCC and SCCC. The business partners are Dell, Cisco, GreaneTree Technology, MVP Health Care, Liniym, and AlbanyCanCode.