NEW YORK -- There are a lot of big financial firms, medical research institutions, and media companies in New York City. So why are there so few startups? The professor admitted that universities could do more to encourage entrepreneurship, the venture capitalist admitted that it is easier to help big companies than small ones, and the representative of city government said the Bloomberg administration has big plans to boost business in New York City.

At the Building the Broadband Economy 2009 summit of the Intelligent Community Forum held at NYU's Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, a panel of experts said that the economic crisis gives the city an opportunity to reduce its dependence on Wall Street.

"When I arrived here about ten years ago, Silicon Alley was booming," said Mel Horwitch, director of the Broad Street-based Institute of Technology and Enterprise at Polytechnic University and moderator of the a discussion titled "Can This Community Be Saved?"

"The technology industry can balance Wall Street," said Jonathan Bowles, director of the Center for an Urban Future. He noted that there's already a large and growing digital media business in the city and said that some other sectors, such as video games, are also growing.

"Smart, creative people want to come here. To keep them, we need a robust telecoms infrastructure. The number of freelancers is growing. You can see them working out of coffee shops," he added.

Bowles said that the entrepreneurial spirit of New York City compares poorly not only with Silicon Valley but also with San Diego and Boston. "They have experienced technology entrepreneurs. They have seasoned CEOs. We have some but we have a way to go," he said.

Owen Davis, managing director of local early stage fund NYC Seed said that NYU needs to change too. "Stanford professors can pick up the phone and call someone on Sand Hill Road. NYU professors lack those external connections," he said. "As a result, many venture capitalists have offices here but invest outside in New York City."

Indeed, Ian Lynch, president of Brooklyn-based game developer Freeverse told InternetNews.com over instant message that he's already moved from Manhattan to Dumbo in Brooklyn and that his accountant is telling him to move again.

"We love New York City but it's far more expensive then other places. My accountant tells me the that the number one thing I can do to save money would be to leave New York City," he said

He has enough bandwidth -- 30 Mbps from Empire One Telecom -- which satisfies what the company wants as well as what it needs. That's a big upgrade from the DSL service from Bway.net (via Covad) that the company used in Manhattan.

Smith said that since the company sells games globally, it has almost no business reason to be here, but added, "lots of personal reasons though, it's a great town."