‘Silicon Beach’ Kicks Off Annual Festival in L.A.

The Associated Press
The Associated Press

The largest tech event in Los Angeles kicked off in Marina Del Rey on Wednesday night. Organizers of Silicon Beach Fest are anticipating over 2,000 techies to attend the conference over the course of the next three days.

The area encompassing Santa Monica, Venice and Playa Vista is known as Silicon Beach for its growing technology footprint, and is home to numerous startups, as well as branch offices of companies like Google, Yahoo! and YouTube.

California’s struggling economy has just reemerged from a dark period thanks in large part to its booming tech industry.

“We have start-ups, Hollywood tech, folks from San Fran. and New York that flew in,” Digital L.A. founder and CEO Kevin Winston told local CBS News KCAL-9 affiliate in Los Angeles.

Some of the panels include a discussion on Israel’s growing influence in the tech world, a panel on L.A.’s pioneering role in 3D-printing, and an event devoted to “Chinese Investments in Silicon Beach.”

According to the L.A. Economic Development Council, Los Angeles has more people employed in high-tech jobs (368,500) than any other metro region in the U.S.

This is Silicon Beach Fest’s third year.

Follow Adelle Nazarian on Twitter @AdelleNaz and on Facebook

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