What’s stopping Silicon Alley from being the best place to build a startup, grow a business, or develop the next big tech platform? It seems that in NYC, the constant struggle to mediate startup innovation and government regulation is the greatest hindrance. Uber, 23andMe, and AirBnB are just a few disruptive companies that have faced huge regulatory hurdles in the past couple years. Fortunately, these companies have been able to work through tough government policies to ensure their survival. However, many early stage startups may not be up to this challenge; instead, they see these regulatory battles as examples of why not to set up shop in NYC. 

When startups must face opposition from entrenched interests and crippling regulatory policies, opportunities for innovation become fewer and fewer. Our panel of business leaders will give their take on overregulation and discuss innovative solutions that could strengthen public and private partnerships. They’ll not only explain not only what is holding the NYC tech scene back, but what makes this city so uniquely oriented to welcome the next generation of ground-breaking tech companies.

About the Speakers

Tom Jessop is the President of Chain, Inc. He joined Chain from Goldman Sachs, where he was Managing Director, Technology Business Development and Chief Financial Officer of the Technology Division. Tom's entire 17-year career at Goldman Sachs was focused on creating and investing in technology platforms for capital markets. In his Technology Business Development role, Tom led a number of successful investments and joint ventures. Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, Mr. Jessop was a Managing Director at Standard & Poor’s where he was responsible for launching and running several businesses, managing cross-functional teams, and providing strategic planning and marketing leadership.

Tom holds an MBA from New York University and a BA, Economics, from The College of the Holy Cross. He is a director of Tuesday’s Children, which provides assistance to 9/11 families and other victims of global terrorism, and is Co-Chair of the Holy Cross Leadership Council of New York.

Paul Martino is General Partner of Bullpen Capital. He is the founder of four companies including Ahpah Software (a computer security firm acquired by InterTrust); Tribe (one of the world’s first social networks), and Aggregate Knowledge (a big data advertising attribution company acquired in 2014 by Neustar). 

Prior to forming Bullpen, he was an active angel investor and personally invested in the first rounds of Zynga, TubeMogul, and uDemy. Paul founded Bullpen in 2010 and has led several of its key investments including FanDuel, Namely, Ipsy, SpotHero, Classy, and Airmap. Paul holds a BS in Mathematics from Lehigh University and a Masters in Computer Science from Princeton University. 

Julie Samuels is Executive Director of Tech:NYC. Before that she was Executive Director at Engine, a nation-wide nonprofit focused on technology entrepreneurship and advocacy, where she remains a member of the Board.

Earlier in her career, Julie worked at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), where she was a senior staff attorney and the Mark Cuban Chair to Eliminate Stupid Patents. Before joining EFF, Julie litigated IP and entertainment cases. Prior to becoming a lawyer, Julie spent time as a legislative assistant at the Media Coalition in New York, as an assistant editor at the National Journal in D.C., and worked at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) in Champaign, IL.

Julie earned her J.D. from Vanderbilt University and her B.S. in journalism from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She serves on the Boards of Engine, and the Internet Education Foundation, TechCongress, and on various Advisory Boards, such as of the Defensive Patent License and the License on Transfer Network, as well as on ABNY's Steering Committee and Comptroller Scott Stringer’s Red Tape Commission. She lives in New York City with her family.

Moderator

Fitz Tepper is a writer at TechCrunch based in New York City.

He writes about a wide range of topics including sports, hardware, payments, social apps, government legislation and more.

Fitz also frequently does video interviews for TechCrunch, and has sat down with media personalities including Steve Wozniak, D.J Khaled and Casey Neistat. He is also a frequent technology commentator on CNN’s Los Angeles-based “CNN Newsroom”.