How a Chief AI Officer Is Driving Miami’s Rise as a Global AI Hub

Miami isn’t just having a moment. It has become one of the fastest growing AI hubs in the world, and this episode breaks down the real reason why.

In this conversation, I sit down with Burhan Sebin, Chief AI Officer at eMerge and the creator behind Miami AI Hub. Burhan has supported more than 500 startups, helped scale a community from a handful of builders to thousands, and has a front-row seat to Miami’s rise as a global center for AI, robotics, and applied innovation.

We talk about the forces pulling founders and technologists into Miami, the cultural momentum shaping the city, and what the next year of AI adoption will look like across agents, automation, and the physical AI wave.

You’ll also get an inside preview of the Tech Basel Miami AI Summit and the vision behind Miami AI School, the hybrid program helping professionals build and apply AI in real time.

This episode is for anyone curious about where AI is heading, why Miami is leading, and what opportunities are opening for builders in 2026.

Topics We Cover:

• What’s fueling Miami’s rapid AI growth and global attention
• How community-led adoption accelerates innovation faster than tools alone
• Why founders, creatives, and engineers are relocating to Miami
• The shift from chatbots to AI agents to physical AI
• How Miami AI School is helping professionals upskill and build
• What to expect at Tech Basel Miami AI Summit and eMerge Americas

Resources Mentioned:

• Tech Basel Miami AI Summit
• Miami AI Hub
• eMerge Americas

Connect with Burhan 

LinkedIn: Burhan Sebin

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Transcript

Burhan Sebin: 0:00

Miami had all the ingredients already, like great talent, capital was in flowing here. Geographically, it has the best location, super close to Latin America. And also it's five hours from London. And also people here are like, they're entrepreneurs. When you are in the city, you feel that like everyone is a builder here. We are not here just for the beautiful weather like we are here to build.

Brooke: 0:25

​Welcome to How I AI the podcast featuring real people, real stories, and real AI in action. I'm Brooke Gramer, your host and guide on this journey into the real world impact of artificial intelligence. For over 15 years, I've worked in creative marketing events and business strategy, wearing all the hats. I know the struggle of trying to scale and manage all things without burning out, but here's the game changer, AI. This isn't just a podcast. How I AI is a community, a space where curious minds like you come together, share ideas, and I'll also bring you exclusive discounts, and insider resources, because AI isn't just a trend, it's a shift, and the sooner we embrace it, the more freedom, creativity, and opportunities will unlock. Have you just started exploring AI and feel a bit overwhelmed? Don't worry, I've got you. Jump on a quick start audit call with me so you can walk away with a clear and personalized plan to move forward with more confidence and ease. Join my community of AI adopters like yourself. Plus, grab my free resources, including the AI Get Started Guide. Or try my How I AI companion GPT. It pulls insights from my guest interviews along with global reports, so you can stay ahead of the curve. Follow the link in the description below to get started. Miami is having a tech hub moment right now, and my guest today is someone who has helped shape the pulse of the city's tech scene. Burhan Sebin is the Chief AI officer at eMerge and the force behind Miami AI hub. He's worked with more than 500 startups, helped build the community from the ground up, and sees firsthand what makes this city such a magnet for global builders. In our talk, he shares what he first saw when he landed in Miami, and why he knew it was the perfect place to create an AI ecosystem. He talks about the rise of talent, the flood of investment, the energy of founders here, and why Miami feels more like a launchpad than a city. This is a grounded, inspiring look at where the tech scene is headed here. And if you care about innovation community, or what the future of tech looks like at the street level, you'll get so much out of this interview. Alright, let's dive in.​Welcome Burhan. I'm so happy to have you today and welcome to How I AI.

Burhan Sebin: 2:54

Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. I, I feel like this is gonna be great.

Brooke: 2:59

Yes, we're gonna get into a good conversation today, and I really just wanna start and open the floor you've had such a fascinating career arc and you're doing such exciting things for the city of Miami. Um, could you share a little bit about yourself and how you ended up to where you are today?

Burhan Sebin: 3:16

For sure. So Burhan Sebin. I'm originally from Turkey. I started my career in Turkey at Proctor and Gamble as a brand manager, and then, after quite some time, I quit, start my own business, moved to New York, uh, and that was where I started to use machine learning Calgary teams. That's how I met with AI while doing my CS Master in New York and building my company and then Micro Globe. Back in that time we were saying automated influencer marketing platform. If I built Micro Globe right now, I would say AI agents for influencer marketing. So that's how I met with ai. And then during the pandemic I moved to Miami, just like other hundred thousand people and and built AI hub here, work with City of Miami and mayor, and also had a chance to work with over 500 startups, you know, have a chance to help them. And then after the acquisition, now I'm part of the eMerge team. I'm leading all the AI related stuff internally and also leading our AI initiatives as Chief AI Officer at eMerge.

Brooke: 4:39

Incredible. You got right to work. When you got to Miami, you wasted no time. Let's dive in first with, your, uh, work with the Miami AI Hub. I think it's amazing the work that you do for startups and incubators and what really inspired that creation? And if you could share a little bit about the impact that it's had on the local tech community here in Miami.

Burhan Sebin: 5:03

Definitely, I mean, when me start Miami, AI Hub Miami had all the ingredients already, like great talent capital was in flowing here. Geographically, it has the best location, I think like super close to Latin America. It's door to Latin America and also it's very like five hours from London. And also like people here are like, they're entrepreneurs. When you are in the city, you feel that like everyone is a builder here. It's not just, we are not here just for the beautiful weather, like we are here to build. And you feel that when you go to these events, when you go to these programs and when we start Miami AI hub, like literally, we were just five to 10 people talking about ai, and now we have over 5,000 members. So I think that shows the impact of AI Hub and ai. So not all credits the AI hub, of course, a lot of builders, a lot of community leaders here working on AI adoption in Miami. So basically at AI Hub, what we are doing is trying to make Miami as an AI hub and increase the AI adoption through events, programs, initiatives. And since then, we host dozens of startups. We host a lot of big tech companies like NVIDIA, Apple, AWS, Google Cloud, IBM, like you name it. And I think Miami AI have become that meeting point for all the builders, investors, operators in AI in Miami, and that's so like nice to see it.

Brooke: 6:49

Yeah, it's really nice to see it. I agree. There is such a strong Latin American influence. You know, it's very bilingual here in Miami and it brings a lot of diversity and culture to the play. Um, I'm sure you see a lot of really dynamic startups, come out through the initiatives and events that you put through. My next question for you, since you have been in this space for quite some time and, have such vast knowledge from everything you've done at Red Bull and Proctor and Gamble, what do you see the future happening? I always say that 2025 was the year of the AI agents. What do you see from all of your experience and, and being so close to these startups and creative spaces? What do you see coming through for 2026 for any AI trends?

Burhan Sebin: 7:42

You are definitely right. I think 2025 was a year for AI agents, like when this generative AI trends start. So it was only chat bots, so like it was super reactive. So you ask a question, you get a reply, like you get an answer.

Brooke: 8:00

Mm-hmm.

Burhan Sebin: 8:00

and then these AI models become better. And now eventually AI agents, now they can take actions. So it's not just reactive now, it's, it can be a proactive model when you integrate with, like when you engage with ai. So the next step, I believe it's gonna be physical ai. We're gonna see more robotics applications. We are gonna see more robotics use cases. Because when you look at the innovations, so like for example, like mobile apps, right? If smartphones wouldn't be, you know, in everyone's hands, probably mobile application revolution wouldn't become a thing, right? It wouldn't be adopted by masses. So I believe AI needs something like that, like something in hardware, like something in robotics, probably to adopt by masses.

Brooke: 9:05

I just saw a couple weeks ago they announced that robot Neo to be in your home and tidy up after you and put your laundry away. What do you think about that? Do you want a neo in your house?

Burhan Sebin: 9:19

I mean. Probably that will be so helpful for the, for the things you don't wanna do at home, right? Like to iron your shirt, like wash your dishes, et cetera. So I believe they're gonna be everywhere. Eventually I.

Brooke: 9:36

Yeah. I agree. I think that robotics is just gonna explode in the next year as well. So, exciting things ahead. My next question for you, since the acquisition of eMerge, um, acquired Miami AI hubs and, you're working very closely together to bring this really exciting event coming up in Miami, I'm really looking forward to it, the Tech Basel Miami AI Summit. I know that you're already bringing together leaders from meta, hugging face, microsoft, Google, cast ai. if you could share more and tease a bit more of what's coming through this December for this summit, what do you really hope this year's conversations will accomplish?

Burhan Sebin: 10:22

That's, that's wonderful. So. This partnership with eMerge. I mean that that was a great fit for AI Hub because AI Hub was trying to make Miami as a global AI hub and eMerge was working on that like for over 12 years already. And they did amazing job and impact in the community in Florida here. And now it's becoming a global conference and global meeting point for the builders I masters and operators. So. After this partnership, we launched a couple of new initiatives, and that's Miami AI School, where we teach people how to integrate AI to their business operations, their daily life. And we were already organizing our monthly events where we host a lot of big tech companies and startups and entrepreneurs. That's how it grew from, you know, thousands of people to thousands of people through these monthly events. And another initiatives that we announced is Miami AI Summit, and I'm super excited for that. Literally because AI Summit is we are merging all the efforts together. What we did for the monthly events because for those monthly events, we usually chose a theme. Like for example, like one month, it's AI in healthcare, AI in finance, AI in national security, AI in robotics. So we did all of that and now we are merging all those topics into one event. It's an all day event. We are gonna host amazing speakers. Like Clem from hugging face, Leon from cast ai, speakers from Meta, Google, Microsoft, and NVIDIA like JP Morgan and a lot of great AI startups, local AI startups and global AI startups. You will hear them. We have keynote panels and workshops. So like similar to AI school, the idea, you know, what builds it. AI school. We are, uh, also teaching people like how to build AI products, AI applications, and automations at AI Summit because everyone talks about ai, but really that's my favorite part, to show people how they can use, like how they can use AI actually in their business operations and daily life.

Brooke: 12:49

Absolutely. I actually got a chance to attend one of the eMerge workshops that they're putting on throughout the city, um, for small businesses in partnership with Rebrand X, who I know was a speaker at last year's eMerge conference, so that was really cool. A free local community workshop. I can only imagine with a jam packed week of events that you're gonna have things like that

Burhan Sebin: 13:14

definitely, that's one of the events that you don't want to miss.

Brooke: 13:18

Um, speaking of eMerge Conference, I know it happens every April, here in Miami. Maybe you can tease a little bit about that conference coming up. It'll be here soon. Before we know it, um, anyone considering attending, if you could just share a little bit about that conference and expo and who it's really for and why it's such an important moment for the tech community here in Miami.

Burhan Sebin: 13:44

So just like Miami AI Summit, right? So we have keynotes, panels, workshops, imagine hundred X of that, and that's Emerge Americas. So Emerge is focusing on mainly four verticals, ai. National security, healthcare and finance, and the attendees will see there will be a unique. Stage for each of these verticals. There will be AI stage, there will be AI pavilion, there will be AI workshops, deep tech workshops, and then same thing with other verticals as well. And also there will be a main stage where previously we host City Wozniak, Eric Schmitz, Palmer Lucky, or Tom Brady, Pitbull, like celebrities in both verse creative industries, sports industry, mainly tech industry. So it's an experience, I would say. It's not just you go and you know, listen some speeches, listen some keynotes, and then take some notes and leave it. It's an experience that literally will change part of your life. So I try to attend every eMerge since I moved to Miami for the last five years. And every time I attend the emerge, literally part of my professional life changed. I made a lot of great friends. Um, I mean, I found a lot of, you know, great companies to work with, investors to work with. So. I usually say like it's a big family wedding that you see everyone there. If someone works in tech in, they're gonna be there, so you should be there too.

Brooke: 15:30

Beautiful. Yes. In my personal experience of walking the expo floor last year is when I first got to learn about their startup accelerator program. And everybody that I know that's in the tech founder space, I've been sharing those details to apply to that program, which I think is just phenomenal opportunity. I also, last year got the chance to attend Pitbull's talk and he is such an incredible motivational speaker. And to your point, there is just electric energy and it's fun. It's not your average, you know, expo conference. It's got that Miami flair to it.

Burhan Sebin: 16:11

Definitely. Definitely.

Brooke: 16:13

How I AI is brought to you in partnership with the Collective AI, A space designed to accelerate your learning and AI adoption. I joined the collective and it's completely catapulted my learning, expanded my network, and showed me what's possible with ai. Whether you're just starting out seeking community or want done for you solutions, The Collective gives you the resources to grow your business with AI. Amazing. I would love to open the floor and share any personal insights that you want to have listeners as your final key takeaway as we wrap up this conversation. Or anything that you want to share more about further.

Burhan Sebin: 16:56

So I wanna like one step back and talk about little bit like why we started Miami AI hub in the beginning and why people, you know, should learn more about AI and attends our events. So there is something I called reaction to innovation, like we innovate first, then we fear and we learn, and then we grow together. So what AI Hub and Emerge AI focusing on actually the learning and growing together part because imagine like when AI first came, everyone thought they're gonna lose their jobs. It's the end of the world for people. And then we started to learn how to use ai and then literally we are growing together. It was just a chat bot. Now it's AI agents. Now we are thinking, you know, it's gonna be, robotics will be everywhere and we will find a way to survive and grow together. So. That's why these events, initiatives like AI school, they're helping like Miami people, Florida people to learn and grow together. And let's not forget, like every city, every region, they have their own strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, right? And. AI has three different layers. Infrastructure layer, application layer, and also adoption layer. So I see Miami has a lot of opportunities, especially in application layer and adoption layer, and I believe with our initiatives with the other AI communities in the region with, you know. The university is doing a lot of stuff like Miami-Dade College, university of Miami, FIU, and through those partnerships and collectively we are gonna create a lot of great use cases in application layer, in adoption layer, and they're gonna be kind of North Star for other regions as well. And if you want to be part of this trend, this rocket ship Miami's AI rocket ship. It's just you have to join us.

Brooke: 19:20

I love that and I resonate so much by what you just shared, and it's one of the key reasons why I started this podcast and I'm growing this community of AI adopters, because not everybody has the. Opportunity to live in a major tech hub or a major city. And it's really important for us to come together and learn from each other and hear how we're each adopting it. Um,'cause there's no right or wrong way to learn. And you can get very wrapped up in the hype news cycles and the marketing of this is the next best thing. And feeling left behind. Or. so many people feel like they don't even know how to begin and feel very intimidated or overwhelmed by the AI and technology, advancements that are happening. And so my hope really is for people to lean more into their communities. Like the Miami AI hub so that they can lean on each other and grow from each other and learn from our collective experiences. I think it's such an important mission. So if listeners wanna join AI school, is it offered remotely? Do you have to be here physically? If you could more about those details.

Burhan Sebin: 20:42

So Miami AI School is a three months program. It has three phases. First. pahse focusing on mostly AI fundamentals. Second phase is focusing on mostly AI adoptions and building your first AI application through web coding. And third phase is all about AI agents. We just launched the third phase this week, actually the the last week. And it's all about AI agencies. The feedback from those students. That's amazing. That's outstanding. And. It's a hybrid program, so like for each month we have eight sessions and four of them are online, four of them are in person.

Brooke: 21:24

Hmm.

Burhan Sebin: 21:24

and we also, we are also communicating almost every day with the students giving feedback to their projects because AI school is not just, you come here, you just listen and live like literally. On the first session of phase one, you build voice AI agents and most of the students attendees, they are small business owners or tech execs. So when you teach them how to build voice AI agent in the first day, the second day, they started to use it because they have that environment to test these tools and use it. And when they see the value and they see the value, believe me, and then they, they continue to use those.

Brooke: 22:09

Wow, that sounds like such a supportive container. I think that. Yep. Getting together in person gives you such accountability. We live in a time where information is everywhere. You can upskill and learn in a lot of different ways right now, even for free online, but. Actually putting that information in play and, and, and the real use case and application of building and then using and trial and error. Uh, I think those in-person schools and communities still is really relative, um, to be coming in and doing those creative sprints and, putting that information to use. And I could see why accountability is needed, and why someone would wanna join a program like that. So I can't thank you enough for everything that you're doing for the City of Miami and all the cool things that you have coming through, through this year and this spring. Would love to. Give an opportunity for listeners to reach out to you, maybe get more involved. For any founders or professionals that are listening, what's the best way to engage with you, whether that's through partnerships or volunteering with the Miami AI Hub, how can they connect? Sure. So we usually super active on LinkedIn and social media so they can reach out to me personally or AI hub on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter. And also like they can follow. eMerge America social media platforms as well. So if someone from the audience know me, like no idea is crazy enough for us. So like we're open to any ideas, any partnership opportunities, and if you just wanna be part of this momentum, AI momentum in Miami, we would love to help you or we would love to collaborate. So please reach out to me on LinkedIn or any social media. Our follow our icons. Uh, happy to chat more. Wonderful. Well, thank you again for your time today and I really enjoyed just getting to hear more about the ins and outs of the communities that you're building and growing here for the city of Miami. So thank you so much, Burhan.

Burhan Sebin: 24:35

Thank you so much, Brooke. It's was great to be here. Great to talk with you.

Brooke: 24:39

Wow, I hope today's episode opened your mind to what's possible with ai. Do you have a cool use case on how you're using AI and want to share it? DM me. I'd love to hear more and feature you on my next podcast. Until next time, here's to working smarter, not harder. See you on the next episode of How I AI. This episode was made possible in partnership with the Collective AI, a community designed to help entrepreneurs, creators, and professionals seamlessly integrate AI into their workflows. One of the biggest game changers in my own AI journey was joining this space. It's where I learned, connected and truly enhanced my understanding of what's possible with AI. And the best part, they offer multiple membership levels to meet you where you are. Whether you want to DIY, your AI learning or work with a personalized AI consultant for your business, The Collective has you covered. Learn more and sign up using my exclusive link in the show notes.