As far as tech expos go, this was no CES, the Consumer Electronics Show held every year in Las Vegas. Here at the BIT Center in Tijuana, there were only a few dozen vendors — a social media firm; a consulting company that helps maquilas manage their inventory and customs paperwork.
But some here really believe the border city has a future as an innovation mecca, like Silicon Valley.
![Olin Hyde vice president of business development for ai-one.](https://cdn.kpbs.org/dims4/default/cddf044/2147483647/strip/true/crop/5184x3193+0+132/resize/880x542!/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fkpbs-brightspot.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com%2Fimg%2Fphotos%2F2013%2F02%2F28%2Fowlin.jpg)
“It’s got all of the right ingredients,” said Olin Hyde, vice president of business development for a La Jolla-based company called ai-one.
“Mexico graduates twice the number of engineers per capita as the United States," Hyde said. "We have the opportunity to do cross-border collaboration. There’s already a burgeoning high-tech industry here manufacturing everything from TVs to cyber-security products.”
Hyde’s company just developed an artificial brain that he says can learn in the same way children do. And he hopes Tijuana’s young and tech-minded will find ways to put it to good use. His company is holding a hackathon here in April, inviting developers from Tijuana and San Diego to do just that.