South Florida Tech HubSouth Florida Tech Hub
06
Jan, 2023

2022 | A Year In Review

on January 6, 2023 / by Nikki Cabus ,

Read Time 19 Minutes

After almost two years of a worldwide pandemic, 2022 was a year of renewed energy for the South Florida tech ecosystem. As one of the first organizations in South Florida who began building our tech hub back in 1995, it has been refreshing seeing the community begin to come together for one purpose over the last couple years. New to South Florida tech? Check out last year’s 2021 recap.

As people began to get back out and about, the Tech Hub mission statement of “Building South Florida’s Tech Hub” was seen and felt stronger than ever. As Tech Hub Chair Michael Fowler said just prior to starting out the 2022 year, “There’s one unified voice in South Florida that’s ready to be a unified region.” From Miami, Broward, Palm Beach and now Martin County, 2022 was a year of great highs and lows in the tech industry, but showed our tenacity as a community.

Real change takes a lot of committed people and organizations – these are just a few of those people and their stories Tech Hub highlighted throughout the year.

 

JANUARY

TEE OFF 2022 – Miami Gardens

We started off the year with our annual Tech Hub TEE OFF 2022, at the hi-tech Top Golf Miami Gardens, sponsored by Crown Castle Fiber.

This SOLD OUT event had 150 people in attendance from all across the region enjoying great food and drinks, a fun game of golf and helping raise $1000 for our kids coding program, Code Palm Beach.

Thank you to all our sponsors and community partner, The Lab Miami, for coming out and learning more about Tech Hub, how your membership dollars are being used, what you can do to get involved, and, of course, meet some of the best people around!

 

 

FEBRUARY

Synapse Summit 2022 – Tampa

From the #BocaTechHappyHour (Boca Raton) to the GrowFL Awards (Orlando) to Synapse Summit (Tampa), February featured all sorts of events that feature the growth in the state.

We were proud to represent tech in South Florida at Synapse Summit in Tampa. South Florida Tech Hub CEO, Nikki Cabus, had the opportunity to discuss “Florida’s Innovation & Opportunity” with panelists Melissa Medina, President of eMerge Americas, David Adelson, Executive Director of IT at Orlando Economic Partnership, and CEO and Co-Founder of Synapse, Brian Kornfeld.

There were also tons of Tech hub members and partners represented during the event!

 

 

MARCH

Black Founders Brunch – Ft Lauderdale

Tech Hub started the month off by attending the CIO Council of South Florida’s State of the CIO where CIOs from across the region come together to discuss trends in the market.

We also collaborated with The Center for Black Innovation and Broward College’s BCEx program supporting underrepresented entrepreneurs in South Florida for our first-ever Black Founders Brunch with a full 3-course meal free and a chance to hear from special guest speakers including entrepreneur, data scientist, and technologist, Ernesto Lee.

We also had our #JupiterTech Happy Hour, Web3 Tech Talk, and Women’s International Day Breakfast, both sponsored by TriNet. The women’s breakfast brought together 50 women who discussed everything from love, loss, sex, happiness, passion, career, and support for one another.

 

APRIL

SoFlo DevCon 2022 – Davie

What a month!! MiamiTech Month soon became known as #SoFloTechMonth. Although the “Miami Metro Region” includes both Broward and Palm Beach, many people across the country are still unaware. The more we educate  we will begin to successfully use the power of each county to support the growth of the entire South Florida tech ecosystem.

Tech Hub created a campaign and webpage to highlight ALL the tech, innovation, and startup activity across the region. SoFloTechMonth.org featured community meetups, pitch events, networking events, and tech conferences from Tech Hub’s #MiamiTech Happy Hour Tech Hub & FAU Tech Runway Pitch Clinic to the eMerge Americas to SoFlo DevCon 2022 and our Think Tank Thursday at The Lab Miami and so many more!

Tech Hub acquired Code Camp in 2022 and rebranded it to SoFlo DevCon. Held at NSU Davie and sponsored by Schonfeld Strategic Advisors, the event had almost 800 in attendance and entrance was FREE to all attendees. This year’s 17th annual SoFlo DevCon attracted developers, engineers, designers, project managers and over 100 speakers. Tracks included everything from AI to blockchain to cloud and even entrepreneurship – learn, connect and grow!

 

MAY

Cinco de Mayo Golf – Hollywood

You’d think that after a crazy jam packed month like April that we’d slow down a bit in May..

Nope.

From Brightline Train’s anniversary to Tech Hub’s annual Cinco de Mayo Golf Tournament, our first in-person Mayor’s Roundtable discussion, supporting FAU’s annual Data Science & AI Conference, we once again had a month full of activity and news.

Sponsored by TechStrong, our golf tournament 140 golfers enjoyed an afternoon of golf, lunch, raffles, contests and help raise over $1000 for our k-12 Code Palm Beach program.

 

JUNE

IDEA Showcase – Ft. Lauderdale

From the international Ingram Micro Cloud Summit in Miami, 22nd ITEXPO and IDEA Showcase in Ft. Lauderdale, EmpowerHER Networking Event at NSU Davie, FAU & Fenway Group Mentorship Program in Boca Raton, Cuddle Party with Puppies, sponored by BlueAlly Technology Solutions, in Ft. Lauderdale and back to West Palm Beach for our #WestPalm Happy Hour, sponsored by TriNet, we were ALL OVER South Florida this month!

Tech Hub has been collaborating with the ITEXPO for the past three years in an effort to highlight more South Florida tech companies and startups. We support through obtaining speakers, sponsors/exhibitors, promotion, coordination of panels, and help organize the IDEA Showcase startup pitch competition.  Last year’s first place winner was Modern Trials!

 

JULY

Tech Hub Birthday – Ft. Lauderdale

July marks exactly one year since Tech Hub and TechLauderdale began discussions to unify and become one stronger organization so we decided to celebrate our “First Birthday Party” sponsored by Focus GTS and Signature Consultants.

We were so blessed to have over 200 of the best people in our tech hub community attend. From educational intuition leaders to startup founders, CIOs, bootcamp students and tech professionals, we were so happy to have you all there to celebrate with us!

With SFTA/TechLauderdale being one of South Florida longest standing tech associations and Tech Hub being the fastest growing, the merger only made that much sense in bringing the region together even and making a statement that collaboration is key. Check out the highlight video here by Focus GTS!

 

AUGUST

Pitch & Pour – Coral Gables

With so many local stories and events this month, Tech Hub stepped up our coverage. It’s crazy to think the below is only a snapshot of all the activity and news stories from the month!

We started out the month with a sold out Founder & Tech Leaders Happy Hour, sponsored by c3 Complete, PeakActivity, and Think Systems, that brought our about 50 tech leaders from across South Florida. The event was held at the brand new beautiful Easton Rooftop Pool & Lounge in Ft. Lauderdale. We then held the

Our Pitch & Pour held in the beautiful Merrick Manor in Coral Gables was another sold out event and certainly the highlight of the month for many. The event brought together startup founders in a non-stressful environment to pitch their ideas to local investors – no stage, no microphones, no prize pot, no winner. Just founders ready to pitch and funders ready to listen.

The Crypto Connect & NFT Expo was held at the Palm Beach County Convention Center making it one of the largest South Florida crypto events and the first of its kind in Palm Beach County.

Our Tech Talent Fest held at Signature Grand in Davie was sponsored by Semantix North America and brought hiring companies and partners together from across South Florida. Featured hiring companies such as ModMed and Signature Consultants spoke to the job seekers about their companies and the importance of networking and building relationships.

We closed out the busy month at Palm Beach State College’s Lake Worth Campus celebrating the awarded over $1 million by the state of Florida as part of a $15.6 million initiative to prepare students and mid-career professionals for jobs in the burgeoning fields of cybersecurity and information technology. Tech Hub CEO Nikki Cabus was invited to speak among the distinguished speakers Tech Hub’s support of the grant and overall tech community.

 

SEPTEMBER

Back-To-School Bowling – Davie

SIM South Florida and SIM National came together during a “Back-To-School Bowling Tournament” at Bowlero in Davie, Florida to raise funds in support of both Code Palm Beach and SIM Foundation. The SIM bowling tournament raised almost $5000 and SIM National has agreed to match an additional $1000! These funds will benefit both Code Palm Beach’s rebrand, to hire staff, and expansion into Broward and Miami-Dade counties, as well as SIM’s ELD program and leadership development initiatives.

Launched this month, the South Florida Talent Report is a resource for our tech industry stakeholders and partners as a guide for our decisions, our companies, education institutions, and economic development partners are similar in this thinking. Our Talent Committee has led with a small team to identify and respond to the needs of our quickly progressing industry.

We held our #MiamiTech Happy Hour this month in which TriNet sponsored the first 50 guests’ drink tickets and our Ladies Lunch in collaboration with SIM South Florida’s SIM Women. They were both a great way to unwind, connect and bring together folks in a laid back and fun environment.

 

OCTOBER

CxO Dinner – Deerfield Beach

Tech Hub started the month off strong with our annual Tech Hub Hackathon. This year’s event was held in collaboration with FAU’s College of Engineering and presented by Office Depot, FPL and Varis among other community sponsors. This year’s theme “Hack My City” around the idea of civic hacking. Our “city partner” was the City of Hollywood with Mayor Josh Levy involved and the City’s IT Director, Raheem Seecharan, a part of the judges panel.

We also held our first-ever CxO Networking Dinner at the oh-so-cool BrandStar Studios in Deerfield Beach. The presenting sponsor was TriNet and supported by TechStrong Group, Semantix, Signature Consultants, and SIM South Florida.

Opening remarks were given by BrandStar Founder, Mark Alfieri and TriNet representative Maria Vargas, keynote by C3 Complete Founder, Rick Mancinelli, and the night’s open roundtable discussion moderated by Tech Hub’s CxO Peer Group Chair and Founder of PeakActivity, Manish Hirapara. Guests discussed the future of work, efficiency versus resiliency, maintaining an authentic purpose and culture and more!

 

NOVEMBER

Ignite Florida Startup Summit – Boca Raton

Global Entrepreneurship Week is the big focus this month with activities all around the world supporting and highlighting entrepreneurship. Tech Hub and Synapse were named statewide organizers for Florida with Tech Hub hosting the state’s inaugural Ignite Florida Startup Summit.

Ignite Florida was hosted in collaboration with the Boca Raton Innovation Campus (BRIC), RaiseLink, and sponsored by 35 Mules, an Florida Power & Light innovation incubator. The 2-day event was held on Friday and Saturday, November 11th and prior to GEW held November 14th – 20th, 2022 and just in time for Veteran’s Day. Mayor Scott Singer from the City of Boca Raton was in attendance with proclamation in hand and ROTC by his side.

Broward College Entrepreneurial Experience (BCEx) helps program participants achieve their dreams. Those dreams were celebrated at the inaugural BCEx 2022 Showcase in Coconut Creek on November 17th – just in time for Global Entrepreneurship Week. Tech Hub CEO Nikki Cabus received recognition among other community partners that support the BCEx program.

 

DECEMBER

TECHpalooza 2022 – Ft. Lauderdale

The 10th annual TECHpalooza (formerly known as ITpalooza) was shaken up this year!

Out of the convention center and into an interactive atmosphere at the Museum of Discovery & Science in downtown Ft. Lauderdale. Tech Hub has some big plans for this event that usually attracts 1000 – 1500 attendees each year. Our organization is turning this event into a staple tech event with a goal of attracting thousands over the next few years!

Additionally, South Florida Tech Hub was named among 25 Honorees for Miami Inno’s inaugural Fire Awards recognizing people and organizations “that fuel Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties’ expanding tech ecosystem.”

 

 

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2022 | A Year In Review