Tech Anchor?

What is a Tech Anchor? Some writer in the NY Times argues that Tech anchors are companies. Sorry folks but they are Universities. The writer argues:

Silicon Valley and the surrounding region have had these companies for decades, from Hewlett-Packard and Intel to Facebook and Google. The Seattle area has its giants in Microsoft and Amazon. Even Austin has had its own tech powerhouse in Dell, though that company has seen better days. But New York? The biggest city in the country has plenty of tech companies and plenty of tech workers and it is second — though a distant second — among regional tech investment. A giant that can compete with behemoths of Silicon Valley, however, remains elusive. 

First did the writer ever hear of Boston? Route 128? Try taking a trip to Kendall Square! The Tech anchor is a place called MIT. Then Silicon Valley, ever heard of Stanford? Then Austin, how about UT.

Now for New York. There is an effort to put a high tech entity on the abandoned tip of an island in the East River. Land was available but every time I go by I wonder how one gets there. I can take a T train to MIT, and possibly even a car, although Google has apparently bought up all parking spaces, not environmentally friendly but this is not California.

New York has no real high tech institution. Columbia struggles, it is really a Liberal Arts shop, they try to do engineering but not really. NYU, well they got Brooklyn Poly, let's see how that works. Not really that much else.

So one needs a Tech Anchor, the anchor is academic not some start up and the anchor takes a while to mellow. So don't expect this for a few decades at best.