Atlanta, Amazon and tech startups

Colleges and Universities A-Z Emory University
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Are you ready for disruption? No, really.

Well, Atlanta is one example of a place doing things with a certain verve, a certain swing in its step, and a certain identity.

Within its roots lies reinvention. The city symbol, a phoenix, speaks soulfully to this.

Atlanta is a city famous for its tales of love, hip-hop, and housewives, but Atlanta is so much more. There is a rich ecosystem ablaze. Have you heard? It is the tale of more than 700 startups, 275,000 college students, and 100 tech acquisitions and IPOs.

It is the tale of successful entrepreneurs who have invested back into the same community that was the source of their success. It is the tale of entrepreneurs who share diverse backgrounds, race, gender, and ethnicity, but who all have the goal of building amazing companies that improve the lives of others.

It is the tale of a city considered an underdog in this space compared to major hubs such as Silicon Valley, New York City, and Boston, but one that has nonetheless found its voice and continues to find it. It is the tale of Atlanta, an emergent entrepreneurial hub.

https://urbangeekz.com/2017/03/6-reasons-why-atlanta-has-become-a-hotbed-for-tech-startups/

Amazon employs 300 tech workers in Atlanta and is expanding rapidly in the market — one of at least a dozen regional tech hubs the company has around the country.

https://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/news/2017/10/11/amazon-picks-atlanta-for-regional-tech-hub.html

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Atlanta metro area has a million more people than Boston, have you heard? And more corporate headquarters. Atlanta has the world’s busiest airport for many years now, and the largest aquarium, etc. It is the hottest place to make movies outside of Hollywood these days. Who considers it an underdog?? The city isn’t emerging – it surpassed other cities a long time ago in countless ways. Why would Boston be considered a “major hub” compared to Atlanta? The city also has a “voice” for decades now – CNN that is heard around the world. If people outside the South haven’t been paying attention, that explains why they are being surpassed.

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By now, most Atlantans have seen physical evidence of a blossoming tech culture from downtown’s Flatiron City and Ponce City Market to Buckhead’s Atlanta Tech Village—and most have probably heard rumors of local 22-year-olds pulling six figures.

Now, a Forbes contributor helps to verify what city boosters have long been saying: that Atlanta is among the country’s hottest tech boomtowns.

In a report this month titled, “5 U.S. Cities Poised To Become Tomorrow’s Tech Meccas,” Atlanta earns the No. 3 position, just ahead of progressive West Coast darling Portland.

Atlanta isn’t just the only Southern city to be recognized—it’s the only place east of the Mississippi River, as New York has long been established as a tech titan.

The list, in order from the top: Salt Lake City (helped by huge recent investments by Amazon); Denver; Atlanta; Portland, and Seattle.

As Forbes reports, Atlanta’s total tech jobs—think software programming and developing and computer support roles—have exploded by almost 47 percent since 2010. That’s about 20 percentage points higher than the national average, which doesn’t sound too shabby.

One observer, QASymphony CMO Jeff Perkins, told the magazine Atlanta’s vibrant startup and business community—combined with world-class factories of tech talent in Emory University and Georgia Tech—indicates the current tech boom is hardly a fluke.

https://atlanta.curbed.com/2017/3/28/15094456/forbes-atlanta-top-3-tech-mecca-tomorrow