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Tech Valley began as a marketing name for the eastern part of the U.S. state of New York, encompassing the Capital District and the
Hudson Valley The Hudson Valley or Hudson River Valley comprises the valley of the Hudson River and its adjacent communities in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. The region stretches from the Capital District (New York), Capital District includi ...
. Originating in 1998 to promote the greater Albany area as a high-tech competitor to regions such as
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...
and
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
, the moniker subsequently grew to represent the counties in New York between
IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...
's Westchester County plants in the south and the
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to the north, and has since evolved to constitute both the technologically oriented
metonym Metonymy () is a figure of speech in which a concept is referred to by the name of something associated with that thing or concept. For example, the word "wikt:suit, suit" may refer to a person from groups commonly wearing business attire, such ...
and the geographic territory comprising most of New York State north of
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
. The area's high technology ecosystem is supported by technologically focused academic institutions including Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the State University of New York Polytechnic Institute. Tech Valley grew to encompass 19 counties straddling both sides of the Adirondack Northway and the New York Thruway, and with heavy state taxpayer subsidy, has experienced significant growth in the
computer hardware Computer hardware includes the physical parts of a computer, such as the central processing unit (CPU), random-access memory (RAM), motherboard, computer data storage, graphics card, sound card, and computer case. It includes external devices ...
side of the high-technology industry, with great strides in the
nanotechnology Nanotechnology is the manipulation of matter with at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometers (nm). At this scale, commonly known as the nanoscale, surface area and quantum mechanical effects become important in describing propertie ...
sector,
digital electronics Digital electronics is a field of electronics involving the study of digital signals and the engineering of devices that use or produce them. It deals with the relationship between Binary number, binary inputs and outputs by passing electrical s ...
design, and water- and electricity-dependent integrated microchip circuit manufacturing, involving companies including IBM in Armonk and its Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, GlobalFoundries in
Malta Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya. The two ...
, and others. As of August 2022,
venture capital Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing provided by firms or funds to start-up company, startup, early-stage, and emerging companies, that have been deemed to have high growth potential or that have demonstrated high growth in ...
investment in Tech Valley had grown to US$410.92 million. This figure is the sum of VC estimates for Congressional Districts 17, 18, 19, 20, and 21. Westchester County has developed a burgeoning
biotechnology Biotechnology is a multidisciplinary field that involves the integration of natural sciences and Engineering Science, engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms and parts thereof for products and services. Specialists ...
sector in the 21st century, with over US$1 billion in planned private investment as of 2016, earning the county the nickname ''Biochester''. In April 2021, GlobalFoundries, a company specializing in the
semiconductor industry The semiconductor industry is the aggregate of companies engaged in the design and fabrication of semiconductors and semiconductor devices, such as transistors and integrated circuits. Its roots can be traced to the invention of the transistor ...
, moved its headquarters from Silicon Valley, California to its most advanced semiconductor-chip manufacturing facility in
Saratoga County, New York Saratoga County is a County (United States), county in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, and is the fastest-growing county in Upstate New York. As of the 2020 United States census, the county's population was enumerated at 235,509, ...
near a section of the Adirondack Northway, in Malta, New York.


History

The name "Tech Valley", or "Techneurial Valley" as was originally used, is usually credited to Wallace "Wally" Altes, a former president of the Albany- Colonie Regional
Chamber of Commerce A chamber of commerce, or board of trade, is a form of business network. For example, a local organization of businesses whose goal is to further the interests of businesses. Business owners in towns and cities form these local societies to a ...
("the Chamber"), while the shortened name from "Techneurial" to "Tech" was the idea of Jay Burgess. In 1998, the Albany-Colonie Chamber began using Tech Valley as a marketing name for an initial ten-county area centered on New York's Capital District to show in name the merging of entrepreneurial activity and high-tech companies in the region. Tech Valley then evolved into a 19-county region in eastern New York stretching from the Canadian-US border to the northern suburbs of the
city A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...
of New York. The 19 counties were Albany, Clinton, Columbia, Dutchess,
Essex Essex ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England, and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Kent across the Thames Estuary to the ...
, Franklin, Fulton, Greene,
Hamilton Hamilton may refer to: * Alexander Hamilton (1755/1757–1804), first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States * ''Hamilton'' (musical), a 2015 Broadway musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda ** ''Hamilton'' (al ...
, Herkimer, Montgomery, Orange, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Schenectady, Schoharie,
Ulster Ulster (; or ; or ''Ulster'') is one of the four traditional or historic provinces of Ireland, Irish provinces. It is made up of nine Counties of Ireland, counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland (a part of the United Kingdom); t ...
, Warren, and Washington. That region was 15,637 square miles, about 270 miles north–south at its longest and about 80 miles east–west at its widest. In 2010, those 19 counties had a population estimate in 2010 of 2,312,952, a 9.2 percent increase over the 2000 census; population density was 148 people/sq. mile. 51 percent of the population was female, with 48.2 percent male. 88.5 percent of the population was White, 6.2 percent Black, 4.9 percent Latino, 1.5 percent Asian, with a median age of 37.5 years. From the inception of the name, the Chamber stated that it would not limit the label of Tech Valley to just the Capital District; rather, Tech Valley was envisioned as running from IBM's Westchester County plants and headquarters north to Saratoga Springs and west up the Mohawk Valley. Early businesses that used the Tech Valley name helped spread the word, businesses such as Albany Molecular Research Inc. (AMRI) who used the phrase in its job recruitment material,
MapInfo Corporation MapInfo Corporation, initially incorporated as Navigational Technologies Incorporated, was a company that developed location intelligence software. It was headquartered in North Greenbush, New York. Its products included a desktop mapping app ...
, Tech Valley Communications, Tech Valley Office Interiors, and Tech Valley Homes Real Estate. The first use of the phrase by a business may have been the
accounting Accounting, also known as accountancy, is the process of recording and processing information about economic entity, economic entities, such as businesses and corporations. Accounting measures the results of an organization's economic activit ...
firm Urbach, Kahn, & Werlin in 1998, which put the Tech Valley name and logo on its postage meter, shortly before that the Chamber had begun instituting a new telephone greeting, "Albany-Colonie Chamber. Tech Valley. May I help you". Also in 1998, Rupprecht & Patashnick put "Made in New York's Tech Valley" stickers on all its air quality sensors for the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) national monitoring network. In 2000, Tech Valley license plates became available, with three numbers and the letters TEC, for a $34.50 fee, they were the first plates in New York that had a
website A website (also written as a web site) is any web page whose content is identified by a common domain name and is published on at least one web server. Websites are typically dedicated to a particular topic or purpose, such as news, educatio ...
on them- techvalley.org. Initially, the name Tech Valley was derided as over-enthusiastic self-boosterism, but SEMATECH's decision in 2002 to relocate its headquarters to the University at Albany, SUNY began Tech Valley's rise in the public's perception. In 2004, however, when
Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American businessman and philanthropist. A pioneer of the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, he co-founded the software company Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend ...
was asked by an '' Albany Times Union'' reporter what he thought about Tech Valley, he responded that he had no idea where that was; two years later though, $400,000 from the
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation The Gates Foundation is an American private foundation founded by Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates. Based in Seattle, Washington, it was launched in 2000 and is reported to be List of wealthiest charitable foundations, the third largest char ...
was used to fund the Tech Valley High School.


Luring a chip-fab plant

The goal of luring a computer chip fabrication plant ( chip fab) was one of the earliest goals of, and reasons underlying, the Tech Valley name. The plan to get a chip fab to the Capital District predates the Tech Valley slogan. In 1997, New York set out submissions for possible chip fab sites that it could whittle to 10 sites around the state that would be pre-approved and pre-permitted for a chip plant. Years before that the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's RPI Tech Park had been visited by
semiconductor A semiconductor is a material with electrical conductivity between that of a conductor and an insulator. Its conductivity can be modified by adding impurities (" doping") to its crystal structure. When two regions with different doping level ...
companies, but they had chosen not to build. The renewed interest by the region in luring them was spurred by the research centers and training of specialists for the industry by area colleges such as the University at Albany, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Hudson Valley Community College. Responding to the state's request for potential sites, Rensselaer County proposed the same RPI Tech Park site; Schenectady County proposed two sites, one of which was in Hillside Industrial Park in Niskayuna; Saratoga County proposed two sites; and Albany County proposed three sites, two in Bethlehem and one in Guilderland. The state ultimately decided on 13 sites it would aggressively promote, most of which were in Tech Valley. As one of the thirteen sites chosen, the RPI Tech Park site originally met little opposition from the town of North Greenbush in which it sat. As time progressed opposition grew in response to concerns about potential impacts on traffic and the environment. The RPI Tech Park site, which by October 1999 had become one of only nine sites still being marketed by the state, ended when the North Greenbush town council voted to terminate the review process. A site in Wallkill, Orange County was the first site in Tech Valley and in the entire state to receive pre-approval for a chip fab. In 2002, the Saratoga Economic Development Corporation (SEDC) began to tout its proposed tech park, to be named the Luther Forest Technology Campus, in Malta, New York, along the Adirondack Northway within Saratoga County, as a site for a chip plant. It would be there that GlobalFoundries, a spin-off of
Advanced Micro Devices Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD) is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California and maintains significant operations in Austin, Texas. AMD is a Information technology, hardware and F ...
(AMD), decided to build a $4.2 billion chip fab, ground breaking was in July 2009. The State of New York gave nearly $1.4 billion in cash and
tax incentive A tax incentive is an aspect of a government's taxation policy designed to incentive, incentivize or encourage a particular economic activity by reducing tax payments. Tax incentives can have both positive and negative impacts on an economy. Amo ...
s, the largest such package in state history. New York's incentive package was the same as that offered by
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,
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, and
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; though it was not the deciding factor it meant that any region not offering the package was out of contention for the fab. The deciding factor on picking Tech Valley was the $5 billion College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute and the resulting "high-tech ecosystem" put in place during
Governor A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the ...
George Pataki's administration. Subsequently, in April 2021, GlobalFoundries, a company specializing in the
semiconductor industry The semiconductor industry is the aggregate of companies engaged in the design and fabrication of semiconductors and semiconductor devices, such as transistors and integrated circuits. Its roots can be traced to the invention of the transistor ...
, moved its headquarters from Silicon Valley, California to its most advanced semiconductor-chip manufacturing facility in Malta, Saratoga County, New York.


Tech Valley Chamber Coalition

The Tech Valley Chamber Coalition is an organization that is made up of 24 local chambers of commerce from 19 counties of Tech Valley. Those 24 chambers represent over 21,000 businesses, schools, and organizations that employ more than 531,000 workers. It was formed in June 2002 and manages the Tech Valley Portal, and publishes an annual publication called ''Images of Tech Valley''. The 24 local chambers are- * Adirondack Regional Chamber of Commerce *Adirondacks Speculator Region Chamber of Commerce *Albany-Colonie Regional Chamber of Commerce * Bethlehem Chamber of Commerce *Chamber of Schenectady County *Chamber of Southern Saratoga County *Colonie Chamber of Commerce *Columbia County Chamber of Commerce *Dutchess County Regional Chamber of Commerce *Fulton County Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry *Greater
Greenwich Greenwich ( , , ) is an List of areas of London, area in south-east London, England, within the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Greater London, east-south-east of Charing Cross. Greenwich is notable for its maritime hi ...
Chamber of Commerce *Greater Southern Dutchess Chamber of Commerce *Greene County Chamber of Commerce * Guilderland Chamber of Commerce *Herkimer County Chamber of Commerce * Mechanicville/ Stillwater Area Chamber of Commerce *Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce * New Paltz Regional Chamber of Commerce *Orange County Chamber of Commerce * Plattsburgh-North Country Chamber of Commerce *Rensselaer County Regional Chamber of Commerce *Schoharie County Chamber of Commerce *Ulster County Chamber of Commerce *
Whitehall Whitehall is a road and area in the City of Westminster, Central London, England. The road forms the first part of the A roads in Zone 3 of the Great Britain numbering scheme, A3212 road from Trafalgar Square to Chelsea, London, Chelsea. It ...
Chamber of Commerce


Organizations that use the Tech Valley name

*Tech Valley Communications (1999) *Tech Valley Homes Real Estate (2001) *Tech Valley Angel Network (2001) *Tech Valley Chamber Coalition (2002) *Tech Valley Technologies (2003) *Tech Valley Office Interiors (2005) *Tech Valley Exotic Dance Emporium * Tech Valley High School (2007) *Tech Valley Talent *Leadership Tech Valley *Tech Valley Patent, LLC (2011) *Tech Valley Center of Gravity (2012) *StartUp Tech Valley (2013) *Tech Valley Game Space (2014) *FIRST NY Tech Valley Regional Robotics Competition (2014) *Tech Valley Machine Learning, Data Science, and AI Meetup (2016) *Tech Newbies in Tech Valley Meetup (2017) *NetSquared Tech Valley (2018)


See also

* BioValley * Silicon Alley * Silicon Hills *
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...


References

{{coord missing, New York (state) High-technology business districts in the United States Economy of New York (state) Regions of New York (state) Hudson Valley Capital District (New York)