
Pittsburgh gives birth to tech firms, but can't keep them - georgecmu
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10193/1071979-96.stm
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holman
Who cares? Pittsburgh's done a great job in the last decade to work with
startup-minded programs like Carnegie Mellon's ETC to build a good foundation
to start these ventures. Add that to the great technical talent coming out of
Pittsburgh schools and the low cost of living, and it's not a bad start. Lots
of other cities would kill to have a vibrant startup culture.

Building the Valley doesn't happen overnight. Having a good startup culture is
a great first step to getting the money to follow. It's not easy, it's not a
given, but it's a great first step. Not to mention that Pittsburgh's been
doing well in the healthcare and finance worlds, too; I wouldn't be surprised
if venture capital does start flowing in Pittsburgh in the future.

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edw519
_But going public hasn't been as enticing an option during the
recession...Google went public in 2004, a year that saw 218 IPOs. Last year
saw 63 initial public offerings of stock -- not exactly a welcoming market._

Any discussion of public offerings that omits Sarbanes-Oxley is incomplete and
irresponsible. The decline in IPOs has more to do with SOX compliance than the
economy, especially for nimble tech start-ups.

There are many valid reasons for Pittsburgh failing to keep start-ups, but
failing to IPO certainly isn't one of them.

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Mazer23
I'll be moving to Pittsburgh to attend CMU grad school (interaction design)
this fall. I'd never been there before being accepted but overall I've been
really impressed with the city every time I visit.

Its a pretty little city sitting between three rivers and each of its many
boroughs have their own style and lots of little shops and restaurants to
discover. That along with the super cheap cost to live there make it a very
compelling place to live once you get to know it.

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Qz
Its a pretty awesome place -- I'm about to graduate CMU undergrad and I'm not
planning on leaving anytime soon. If I do it will probably be out of the
country before somewhere else in the states.

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rwhitman
Every city wants to be the 'next Silicon Valley' but can never retain the
companies. Its not a problem endemic to Pittsburgh. Can you think of a city
that's not in the west that can honestly claim this title?

Its not just the capital - there's a sense of entrepreneurial manifest destiny
mixed in there that can't be stopped. For a tech company that doesn't have
hard assets there's nothing stopping wide-eyed entrepreneurs from picking up &
moving west. And lets get honest here - Pittsburgh is great but if you're
finally making it to the big time, why would you want to stay in a declining
rustbelt city?

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mtomczak
Property values are significantly lower in Pittsburgh, which makes property
ownership easier. And the top-quality colleges in the city continue to
graduate excellent candidates for tech company employment.

Although a graduate can ship out west, the lower costs in Pittsburgh make the
path to ownership shorter. I'll be interested to see if the economic downturn
will give graduates pause when thinking about shipping themselves three
timezones away into an expensive location, when the cheaper prices in
Pittsburgh could offer a lifestyle with less debt.

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rwhitman
Yea but who graduating college thinks about home ownership?

I left Philadelphia for CA shortly after college 6 yrs ago. I still rent here
and I know that if I stayed in PA I would probably own multiple properties at
this point. Honestly I would rather rent in California than own a mansion in
Pennsylvania. My life is just infinitely better here.

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bmj
I know many graduate students that buy homes during their stay in Pittsburgh
rather than renting, and simply sell when they leave. Often, those homes end
up in the hands of other graduate students.

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timtadh
I mean I am about to do this (in Cleveland at CWRU instead of Pittsburg at
CMU) but the principle of the thing is the same. These cities have some of the
lowest costs of living to be found anywhere in the US. I would also note that
Cleveland has the same problems mentioned in the article to a degree, but is
managing to retain bio-tech firms. This is mainly due to the top notch
institutions (hello Cleveland Clinic) which are in the city.

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jganetsk
Pittsburgh also gives birth to people, but can't keep them.

~~~
holman
Kind of a good thing, really. Pittsburgh was at what, half a million people in
the mid-1900's? It's since been halved. It can't support the same population
as during Steel boom era, and shedding so much population gave it a good base
to reinvent itself as medical, financial, and educational centers of the
region. It's one of the things that Detroit might want to pay heed to.

The other side effect was that since everyone moved across the country, the
Steelers are now one of the nation's most popular teams. And everyone knows
the best barometer for a city's success is sport teams.

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stcredzero
Isn't this true to some extent for every region that's not Silicon Valley?

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pittsburgh
Paul Graham is from Pittsburgh. If he still has some emotional attachment to
the city, perhaps he would be willing to invest in some of the great startups
we have here?

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jimbokun
"If he still has some emotional attachment to the city..."

Judging from what he has wrote about cities in the past, I'm pretty sure he
does not.

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karlshin
Pittsburgh is doing fine. It's a great city to live in. Very attractive, lots
of outdoor activities, low housing, a good base of Fortune 500 companies, and
unlike our neighbors, we retain our sports celebrities. I am a former New
Yorker and have started a handful of companies in Pittsburgh. It's not hard to
get to know who you need to get help. I am optimistic about the city long
term.

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steveklabnik
As a native Pittsburgher and startup founder... we've got a great community
forming, but it's still in the primordial ooze stage. Lots of user groups,
great companies coming out of AlphaLab and other incubators, and an awesome,
tight-knit community.

What we do have is a big problem with talent. I know of at least five or six
companies that are hiring, but they just can't find qualified people. It's
exactly what the article talks about; ModCloth for example pretty much has to
go to the valley to find all that top talent. It's sad but true. Everyone
wants to move to the valley, but nobody wants to move here.

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cageface
Sort of a vicious cycle I guess. I don't think I'm the only coder that's sick
of the crowding and high prices and completely out of reach real estate out
here. I've considered a move to PA but from what I can tell the job market is
about 1/100th what it is in CA, so that's putting a lot of eggs in one basket.

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steveklabnik
If you know Rails, and you're a good programmer, you could easily pick between
a few jobs here.

Just saying.

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api
After having lived on the coast for a while, I can say that people are not on
average that much smarter or hard working there than in a number of other
places. They might be a little bit, but that's because of the "brain drain to
the coasts" phenomenon rather than anything intrinsic.

I can summarize the advantage of the coasts in three words:

Access. To. Capital.

Social networking effects come in a close (and related) second. Tech companies
are in Silicon Valley because tech companies are in Silicon Valley.

