Commerce Secretary Alex Kelly opened his remarks at the third annual Florida Technology & Innovation Solution Summit with a bit of international flattery: a recent nod from the German Consul General dubbing Florida “Team Freedom.”
The envoy, Kelly said, contrasted Florida and its global partners — collaborative, R&D-driven innovators — with those in “unfriendly parts of the world” like China, whose closed systems present both competition and risk.
The challenge for Florida’s innovators is to compete globally while keeping their quality edge — and to build the kind of reputation Germany enjoys, where the name alone signals precision engineering, premium hops, and a higher sticker price. Outside of oranges, few Florida-made products carry that same instant cachet … at least not yet.
Germany’s postwar resurgence earned its own chapter in history textbooks as the “Miracle on the Rhine.” If Florida’s chief economic hype man has his way, future economic case studies might instead recount a “Miracle in the Sunshine” — provided Florida can snap a few more puzzle pieces into place.
A former Deputy Chief of Staff to Gov. Ron DeSantis, Kelly recapped the state’s growth spurt since 2019, when Florida’s economy was pegged at $1.1 trillion. Last year it topped $1.7 trillion; Kelly rounded it up to $1.8 trillion, a figure he clearly sees in reach.
COVID, he argued, was a catalyst. The “Free State of Florida” brand — with its early return to normal, low regulation and lower taxes — drew in frustrated capital owners, entrepreneurs alongside tens of thousands of job-ready out-of-staters. But the next stage of growth will require more than good weather and a light regulatory touch.
Kelly’s pitch: Give both the post-pandemic transplants and homegrown startups every reason to stop treating Florida like their refuge and start treating it like their home.
“There’s also a bit of a moral calling in this conversation. … We really have to support Florida companies, Florida innovators, our universities and colleges that are supporting those innovators,” he said. “Not just make their brand and their product and their service great but … elevate the visibility of that around the world.”
One major obstacle is that 98% of investments from Florida’s largest institutional investors — banks, foundations, pension funds — leave the state.
“Everything we’ve achieved so far in innovation has been done without most of that capital staying here,” he said. “If we just change the paradigm from 2% to 10% the amount of capital that we would pour into this state’s young and up-and-coming emerging companies, we would never look back.”
Kelly also called for a sharper focus on small-business survival. Florida leads the nation in startups, but the other side of the coin is that it tops the list in first-year failures, too, many of them in tech.
“Small business is the benchmark,” he said. “Economic development is no longer just about big companies and big capital; it’s about helping small, innovative businesses survive that first tough year and grow into sustainable enterprises.”
Too often, he added, tech founders get so enamored with their breakthrough that they skip the grind of making it a product consumers want. Florida’s universities and blueblood businesses can help keep them on track.
“Whatever the technology — AI, quantum, or otherwise — we must keep purpose at the forefront. The ultimate goal isn’t just exciting tech; it’s aligning innovation with real-world impact and sustainability,” he said.
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