Jerusalem Venture Partners, NYC Launch Global Cybersecurity Contest With $1M Prize

Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), The Mayor’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer (MOCTO), NYC Cyber Command (C3) and the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) announced the launch of the NYCx Cybersecurity Moonshot Challenge, calling on industry experts to develop and deliver new, affordable, and scalable solutions to protect NY-based small and midsize businesses from cyberattacks. NYCx is a municipal program that seeks to transform urban spaces into hubs for tech collaboration and research.

JVP committed a $1 million prize to selected proposals, with four to eight finalists to receive up to $20,000 to test their proposals in New York City and expand into the international market.

“With the Cyber Moonshot Challenge, our goal is to find solutions designed to make New York City’s small businesses more resilient,” said Laura Anglin, Deputy Mayor for Operations. “This moonshot is an exciting opportunity to partner with experts to drive innovation and safeguard consumer data.”

As cyberattacks increasingly present one of the biggest threats around the globe, the City of New York has established an international consortium of partners to launch this contest. It will collaborate with Israel’s leading venture capital firm, Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), and global partners from Israel, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Berlin, Helsinki, London, and Paris.

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of cities around the world and at the center of the global economy of the future,” said JVP Founder and Chairman Erel Margalit. “Unfortunately, these same companies are too frequently abandoned in their search for state-of-the-art IT and cybersecurity solutions. As a result, our collective aim is to help unleash a new generation of innovation and the Cyber Moonshot Challenge is an important step in that direction,” he adds.

Applicants are requested to submit their initial proposals in February 2019. Winners will be announced that summer.

JVP was recently selected by NYCEDC to establish the city’s first international cybersecurity investment hub, HUB.NYC in SoHo as part of the City’s Cyber NYC initiative