Colorado’s tech scene has experienced exponential growth over the past decade. Contributing $1.8 trillion to the U.S. economy annually, the Colorado tech sector has emerged as a definitive digital hub between America’s east and west coasts. With major tech players present in Denver, Boulder and Colorado Springs, the Centennial State is on the forefront of digital innovation today. 

Denver, ranking 19th in PitchBook’s Global VC Rankings, serves as a key host city for industry meetings that facilitate valuable networking and information sharing opportunities for tech professionals. In fact, this year’s annual Denver Startup Week (September 17-19) and inaugural DenAI Summit (September 19) gathered approximately 12,000 attendees from the Colorado tech scene — an indicator of the city’s rich entrepreneurial spirit.

Our tech PR team attended both events to learn about the latest tech trends happening in the Mountain West. With an established presence in the Front Range, including a localized office in Denver’s vibrant River North Arts District, Matter has helped elevate some of Colorado’s most innovative tech brands with integrated PR, marketing, and creative programs (learn more about our robust B2B tech portfolio here).  

Amongst a variety of insights, the week’s top takeaway was clear: Colorado will continue serving as a critical hub of global tech advancement for years to come. Below is a rundown of some of our favorite panels.

DenAI Summit: Leveraging AI as a Force for Good

The inaugural DenAI Summit, labeled as the country’s first major city-led AI conference, focused on utilizing AI technologies to solve societal challenges. It provided an opportunity to learn how governments, technology innovators, and academia can lay a responsible path forward to use AI technology as a force for good. Keynote speakers included Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn Co-founder), Eric Schmidt (Former Google CEO), and Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins (Promise CEO). The underlying theme across discussions was the importance of incorporating human insight into all processes that might leverage emerging technologies.

The State of Generative AI: Where Are We Heading? In this fireside chat, Schmidt and Denver mayor Mike Johnston discussed the transformative impact of AI on scientific research and discovery — zooming in on how AI is accelerating drug discovery, enhancing genomic sequencing, advancing climate modeling, and driving space exploration.

AI for Everyday Empowerment: Enhancing Affordability, Access, and Wellbeing. This panel, with speakers from Virta Health, Ibotta and Google, analyzed how AI is making healthcare more accessible and goods/services more affordable. In addition, it highlighted how the public sector is leveraging technology to foster economic empowerment.
Colorado and the AI Frontier – Innovations Shaping Our Future. This discussion, with panelists representing CO-based companies such as Vantage Data Centers, Crusoe Energy Systems and Stackhawk, shared insights on how to effectively leverage Colorado’s existing digital infrastructure and the momentum on the jobs front (ADP Research named Denver the hottest job market in the country) to advance the implementation of AI into existing offerings and be able to stay ahead of the curve.

Above all, the DenAI Summit showcased why Colorado’s flourishing tech scene is a result of its dynamic entrepreneurial culture, growing community of investors, and steady cadence of innovation summits and initiatives. Coupled with leading education and research institutions and an increasing talent base, the state offers an ideal setting for both established brands and new startups to thrive.  

Denver Startup Week: Quantum and AI Take Center Stage

Denver Startup Week 2024 featured several panels gathering founders from across fintech, healthcare, cybersecurity, cleantech, and space economy. Discussions revolved around how companies are investing in, building, and applying AI to further their mission and goals, as well as how the state of Colorado is fueling the quantum revolution.   

How Quantum Technology is Changing the World from the Mountain West. This panel resonated with attendees after the White House’s recent recognition of Colorado as the nation’s top quantum computing hub. With panelists representing Maybell Quantum Industries and Buff Gold Ventures, attendees had an opportunity to learn how quantum computing is already driving innovation across telecom, finance, industrial settings, and supply chains. The discussion highlighted a critical partnership between CU Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to accelerate quantum technology development via their state-of-the-art Quantum Engineering Initiative Lab. It also analyzed the economic opportunities associated with quantum computing, with McKinsey projections forecasting the technology could be worth trillions of dollars within the next decade.

Investing & Building in Generative AI. This panel featured Colorado founders and VCs, such as Liminal (a security platform for GenAI use), Freeplay (a platform for AI product development) and Next Frontier Capital, to analyze how AI technologies are being developed, commercialized, and invested in across the Front Range.

Navigating the Future with Responsible AI Usage

The responsible AI usage theme at this year’s DenAI Summit and Denver Startup Week aligned with our own approach to AI implementation across our agency. We continue to keep a pulse on the latest AI trends across the strategic communications landscape via our annual Marketing/Communications Outlook Survey. In addition, we’ve published a collection of informative blogs that share AI-related insights and analysis:

• Power Rankings: The Best Free AI Image Generators
• Assessing the Future of GenAI in PR Content Writing
• ChatGPT vs. Google Gemini: Which Is Better for PR and Marketing?
• Tech Media Has Changed. Tech PR Needs to Change With it