NYU-Poly Varick Street Incubator

New York, New York is one huge city that just never shuts down. The taxis honk all night long and even on the 27th floor there is no peace. This place is action, action, action!

I was fortunate to book in a couple of meetings here with very busy programs and people. First up I met with Steven Kuyan, Operations Manager at New York University's (NYU) Varick Street Incubator.

Steven gave me a tour of the floor that houses the program and startup tenants. Assisted startups were from a wide variety of industries as the program places no limits on who can apply. Steven likes to keep the focus wide for the general program but they did receive a grant for clean energy companies and reserve space and resources specifically for this side project. Steven pointed out that the program aims to assist companies to grow primarily through attaining customers and secondly on acquiring capital (conversely to many programs in the USA from my observations).

An interview with Andrew Cohen, Varick St startup:


When choosing tenants the scalability of the business is considered along with the potential to generate employment. Successful applicants then receive relatively cheap office space and access to other resources to kick start their business. The program does not take any equity in the startups.

The program was started with $80,000 seed capital from the city of New York and the building space was donated by Trinity Real Estate. NYU provides staff costs which means that the remaining program running costs are quite low (taxes, electricity, cleaning etc) and are divided amongst the tenants. Additional revenue is received from corporate sponsors of the program itself or for competitions and events.

I also discussed alumni involvement and benefits to the University from its involvement which I will cover in the final report. Thanks to Steven for his time.