Why Jamaica, Silicon Island of the Caribbean, is the hot new tech hub to watch

Image Credit: Clker-Free-Vector-Images. Retrieved from venturebeat.com

A rising tide, they say, lifts all boats. And in tech, the fastest-rising industry on the planet, it’s a good time to get on board with Jamaica.

The Caribbean country has long been a vacation hotspot for those drawn to its idyllic white sandy beaches and laid-back lifestyle.

Recently, however, “The Rock” has been doing all the right things to position itself not as a solid tourism hotspot, but as the next “Silicon Island” — a moniker that once-developing tech hubs such as Ireland and Taiwan also earned.

Digitization isn’t just about infrastructure; it’s about talent. In 2021, the Jamaican government proved it knew this when it launched its Amber Heart Coding Academy, designed to train thousands of young Jamaicans in software development. But its efforts to jockey for position in the tech-hub race began years earlier with investments in its tech infrastructure as well as education.

Launched in 2019, Jamaica’s Global Services Sector project (a five-year plan) aims to provide Jamaicans with training and access to better jobs in business, knowledge process and information technology outsourcing.

Proximity to the U.S. is a core USP for this nation of just 2.8 million people, as well as the fact that it is an English-speaking territory in a time zone that’s compatible with the U.S.

Competitive labor costs are a factor, of course, attracting interest from corporations beyond the Americas. At the Nexus 2022 event, for example, a central theme was the growth of interest from European tech companies seeking Customer Experience partners in the Caribbean.