Innovation Hub For Crypto, Robotics and Machine Learning Being Built in Connecticut

A new Innovation Hub, being dubbed the ‘Fintech Village’ is being built in an odd place, Hartford, Connecticut under the finance of Seven Stars Cloud, a company led by China-born media-mogul-turned-tech-entrepreneur billionaire Bruno Wu.

The Hub will be aimed at letting students and young professionals the opportunity to collaborate on cryptocurrency, robotics and machine learning related initiatives. The hope is that the area, and its well-known universities and colleges, will strike up a partnership.

Cryptocurrency college

While a cryptocurrency hub in Hartford, Connecticut, seems an odd choice, the idea is that the area is home to a number of high profile colleges. Yale University is in nearby New Haven, and other local colleges include the University of Connecticut, University of Hartford, and University of New Haven. There are also plans to launch a fintech college at the Hartford campus.

Wu and Seven Stars Cloud have clearly identified the hunger for these new forms of technology and understand that there is massive potential to improve the different sectors with the help of university-trained students.

New wave of fintech courses

While Wu’s Hub is something a bit different, being a physical space in which these different sectors can flourish, there is a wave of courses being offered at different universities and online schools.

For example, Fordham University in New York recently launched a fintech secondary concentration for its business students and the  New York University also offers a number of fintech courses, including one in cryptocurrencies and Blockchain.

Growing workforce

The demand for trained fintech workers, in the realms of cryptocurrency, robotics, machine learning and other such areas is rapidly growing as a study shows that job postings for cryptocurrency alone has quadrupled.

“Globally, the pool of talent– people with experience in Blockchain and distributed-ledger technology– is somewhat limited,” Miha Grcar, the head of business development for Bitstamp, said. “This is a big challenge.”