eMerge 2015 (above). Photo by Michael Bolden.  eMerge Americas 2015 presented technology and business with a Miami flair last week.

There was serious business transacted from Downtown Miami to the Miami Beach Convention Center May 1-5. There were discussions about eGovernment, including data security and governance in a new technological environment; the Women, Innovation and Technology summit, and also a startup competition with venture capital as prizes. But there was also star power with figures such as Miami’s own Pitbull (aka Armando Christian Pérez) and Miami Heat player Chris Bosh (a self-proclaimed “nerd” who served as a judge in the startup competition) as well as an extensive national TV network coverage, a fashion show and a hip-hop party.

There were also the all-important numbers. In only its second year, eMerge Americas, funded in part by Knight Foundation, attracted over 10,000 attendees, 500 companies and representatives from 50 countries. And it’s worth noting that there wasn’t innovation just in the booths on the expo floor May 4-5. Martine Rothblatt, author and founder of Sirius Satellite Radio and United Therapeutics, in conversation with CNBC’s “Fast Money” anchor Melissa Lee Monday afternoon, was both dazzling and inspiring. She connected her own personal story (the then-incurable illness of her youngest daughter) with the creation of her medical company (she’s a lawyer by training), followed by a discussion that included robotics and downloading brains that sounded like a plot of a science fiction novel.

Meanwhile, author and speaker Deepak Chopra offered a memorable keynote talk Tuesday morning that improbably connected biology, spirituality, well-being and business, certainly tweaking the programming conventions of a technology conference.

All that said, when Manuel D. Medina, managing partner of Medina Capital and founder of eMerge Americas, spoke on Tuesday morning he reflected on how he had “personally spent a lot of time evangelizing; going from Palm Beach all the way down telling the story as to why this is important.” But then, he conceded he had questioned himself: “Is it worthy? Why am I doing this? Do I really need to do this?”

“Yesterday as I was walking around, first thing in the morning, when those high school kids were doing their business plan competition on center stage … I said, ‘OK, it is worthy.’  When I had someone from the startup competition come to me and say, ‘Look at this,’ and he had just gotten a half a million dollar term sheet, handwritten; it was worthy.”

Medina would have been also moved by José Antonio Ramírez, 12, from St. Mark Catholic School in Broward County, earnestly explaining a board game about Internet security and the small LEGO-like pieces devised by his group, part of For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, a nonprofit that seeks to motivate young people to pursue education and career opportunities in science, technology, engineering, and math. And he no doubt would have been impressed by Ketan Rahangdale, 22, founder and CEO of JOOX Music, which offers a rewards-based music stock exchange, competing in the startup competition. Already a veteran at 22 — he was 19 when he founded the high-quality audio and video company Eartop — Rahangdale was relentlessly enthusiastic as he pitched to whomever would listen. Ketan Rahangdale, 22, founder and CEO of JOOX Music during eMerge Americas. Photo by Fernando Gonzalez.

And Medina would have been proud to hear Dutch architect and designer Daan Groen, co-founder of inThere, a company that uses gaming and social software to create interactive, digital teaching applications.

 “Last we met with the [Dutch] consulate in Miami and they invited us based on the [first eMerge] event. They said, ‘This is where you need to be,’” said Groen. “We are a logistics company and a lot of development is going to start here. Dutch people have a lot of experience with innovation, so for us, it’s the place to be. This is where innovation will happen.”

For Matt Haggman, Knight Foundation’s Miami program director, such comments underscore what he sees as part of a continuing change in how people view Miami.

This year’s eMerge “is a huge improvement over what was a terrific first year,” he said. “It represents another step in changing the perception and focusing attention in what is happening in Miami. The telling of that story is so important —and not only to an external audience. Also, something like eMerge helps establish relationships that might lead to new ventures and collaborations. Finally, it’s important having people leave here feeling inspired.”

Susan Amat, Ph.D., founder of business accelerator Venture Hive and The Launch Pad, a model of entrepreneurship education at the University of Miami, also addressed the changing perceptions of Miami in her Tuesday talk on “Transforming Cities Through Entrepreneurship.”

“The story is getting out on Miami being an incredible place to start a business,” she said.  “That’s really important because if we were just getting Florida companies, cool, they know Miami is awesome. But to have applicants from Bosnia and India … when you start looking at companies that have already gone through one or two or three other accelerators and are at a very high level of growth and they want to come here to figure out how to set up their offices and build their teams, their futures their families … These are people who are going to stick.”

Rahangdale, a senior finance major at the University of Central Florida, is cautiously optimistic about the potential of South Florida as a tech hub.

 “I don’t think we are missing much. We’re there,” says Rahangdale, who was also a venture coach with Blackstone Launchpad. “But it’s important not to get caught up in the glitz and the glamour. We have HP here; we have these big companies, these big sponsors, these cool events. Great. But at the end of the day, as an entrepreneur, I ask, ‘Who is writing the check?’ Because without that infrastructure, those investors, it doesn’t matter if you can teach people how to start a business. That’s like me teaching you how to swim but you live in the desert.”

As it turns out, at the end of eMerge, Rahangdale was both, leaving inspired — and with a check.

The winners of the startup competitions were: VSN Mobile, a Fort Lauderdale company that developed a 360-degree seamless high-definition camera, which won a $100,000 prize; Symptify, based in Sunny Isles Beach, won the so-called early-stage prize of $50,000 in investment, for its online medical self-assessment tool, and JOOX Music, the university-level winner of the competition, walked away with $25,000.

Fernando González is a Miami-based arts and culture writer. He can be reached via email at [email protected].