Webit Webit

 

Sofia, 20th of April 

<Angelhack> <Women Who Code> <Girls in Tech><Front End Girls><Rails Girls>

THE DEV SUMMIT is our dedication to all developers and software architects. The event gathers speakers from three continents to challenge the next generation of DevOps, Agile, UX & UI and more. Quality software building skills are essential for both - startup and enterprise scene. WEBIT.FEST meets you with all components of the digital economy environment. If you’re either skilled, talented or interested to join the army of coders, request your pass and group delegations access from yanita@eacad.eu by 8th of April.   The AGENDA of WEBIT.FEST’16  includes five parallel summits, as well Webit Night Summit with musical, art and cultural events around the Festival + more than 50 meetups on very specific topics which will gather opinion leaders at one place to discuss topics around their expertise. WEBIT Foundation partners with number of global and regional organizations in order to provide opportunities for talented and skilled developers to receive training, coaching, networking and community building. Meet some of the speakers and partners of the DEV SUMMIT here and follow the updates at webit.bg:     Michael "Monty" Widenius  is the main author of the original version of the open source MySQL database, a founding member of the MySQL AB company and is currently CTO of the MariaDB Foundation. MySQL  was acquired by Sun Microsystems for US$1 billion in 2008. His keynote at this year's WEBIT.FEST will take place during the DEV Summit.          AngelHack is the world’s largest and most diverse global hackers and code creators community, who “invent the new and make change happen”. Back in 2011, their first hackathon event in San Francisco gathered 25 developers. Today AngelHack’s community is over 50,000 in 96 cities worldwide. Their target audience is not just programmers or people who can code—it’s anyone with an idea. WEBIT.FEST’16 welcomes Brian Collins, who is the CMO of Angelhack. You can meet him in person and listen to his talk at the DevSummit. Here you can check a recent interview of Brian for our blog.     Women Who Code is a global non-profit organization dedicated to inspiring women to excel in technology careers by creating a global, connected community of women in technology.  WWC was founded in 2011 and has since grown to 50,000 members spanning 20 countries. Women Who Code creates an avenue for women in tech by hosting free meetups around the world, and showcases the amazing careers that it can provide-especially to young girls.   WEBIT.SERIES partner with WWC to advocate and support the XX chromosome into the future of the tech industry. Our platform together is created to provide opportunities and mentorship for girls, who are brave, passioned and excited to code.     Sheree Atcheson is Expansion Director WomenWhoCode. She graduated in computer science from Queen's University Belfast-where 90 percent of her CS classmates were male. Things are about to change these days. Meet her to fall in love with coding!     Google sends two superstars at WEBIT.FEST’16 - the head of app ads for EMEA, Lorenzo Bianchi and Benjamin Faes, who leads the publisher business solutions across Europe. Benjamin joined Google in 2008, initially in charge of launching YouTube and the Google Display Network across Europe, while Lorenzo works on product strategy and advertisers success in app promo ads across all owned & operated Google properties and display. The DevSummit will give you a chance to sneak into Google’s Ad Platforms development team.   Twilio is cloud-based communication service provider based in San Francisco, California, which allows software developers programmatically to make and receive phone calls and send and receive text messages, by merging the worlds of cloud computing, web services and telecommunications.The company now counts nearly 560,000 developers. Some of the largest global enterprises and startup unicorns use Twilio’s platform, including Walmart, Hulu, Uber, Airbnb, eBay, Shopify,Salesforce, Box, Zendesk,Coca-Cola and Lyft. Phil Nash is Developer Evangelist at Twilio, serving developer communities in London and all over Europe. He is a lover of all things front end, a Ruby developer. Meet Phil at the DevSummit of WEBIT.FEST on 20th of April in Sofia Tech Park.   The full lineup of partners and speakers of the DevSummit includes also Datastax, Just Eat, Girls Who Code - Romania and Girls in Tech - Romania, Frond-end Girls Romania, Rails Girls, Association of Software Engineers, Softuni and more.  You can join them at Sofia Tech Park, 20th of April. See you there! Yanita K.    

Sofia Tech Park, 19-20th of April Founders Games is WEBIT's programme for startups. The application is open till 31st of March and the opportunity is limited to 200 startups in 3 stages - early stage, post seed and growth and shall provide them an expo table and opportunity to pitch on stage. How you may join and receive a free pass: We are always happy to welcome quality startups, who challenge the global environment and, who are not afraid to compete. Fill your APPLICATIONS at the following link by end of March: Startups, accelerators and investors could send their request and questions to: yanita@eacad.eu   Our partners network is full of opportunities, so go ahead and check below the list of accelerating programmes, investment funds, mentoring and co-working resources available at WEBIT.FEST 2016.     Startupbootcamp is a global network of industry-focused startup accelerators that provides investment and mentorship services. With programs in Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, Eindhoven, Istanbul, London, Barcelona and Singapore, since launching in 2010, Startupbootcamp has accelerated 241 startups of which 71% went on to receive funding. The accelerator’s programs focus on many different verticals Smart Transportation & Energy, E-commerce, HighTechXL - Hardware Technology, FinTech - Financial Technology and Insurance, Internet of Things & Data, Digital Health.   Hub:raum Krakow offers startups with outstanding business ideas from CEE a comprehensive package of support which includes seed-funding, co-working space, mentoring and access to Deutsche Telekom assets, such as customer bases, technical service and workspace facilities. This year hub:raum organizes two initiative: ChallengeUp! and WARP – you can see details below. The verticals that fit within include: INTERNET OF THINGS, CYBER SECURITY, HEALTH CLOUD BASED BUSINESS SOLUTIONS, CUSTOMER ANALYTICS & BIG DATA, MOBILE PAYMENT & COMMERCE TV, VIDEO & MULTI SCREEN TELECOMMUNICATION & CONNECTIVITY. At the moment you can apply to two programmes: Challenge Up! - Internet of Things Accelerator with Intel and Cisco (2nd edition) hub:raum Kraków WARP – 5th edition   ClujHUB coworking space and Startup Transilvania  The Romanian ecosystem is vibrant place for founders these days with a few strategic startup hubs, the country’s map is getting more and more attractive for investors. Cluj-Napoca, the capital of Transilvania is the symbol of Romanian entrepreneurship spirit, strategically positioned close to five capitals in CEE: Belgrade, Budapest, Sofia, Kiev and Bucharest. The acceleration programmes provide mentoring, work-space and financing of young entrepreneurs.  

Seedcamp invests smart capital into pre-seed and seed stage startups. In 2014, they announced a €20million Seed fund, which enables investments up to €200,000 into rounds between €300,000 and €2M. As of September 2015, Seedcamp has a portfolio of 192 companies and is backed by over 30 institutional Venture Capital firms and angel investors. Participating VCs and advisors in Seedcamp's launch included Index Ventures, Atomico Investments, Atlas Venture, Balderton Capital, TAG, Forsyth Group and Brown Rudnick.  The fund focuses on providing investment for startups looking to scale globally, rather than focusing on the initial hurdle of getting up-and-running.

Startup Poland  is a grassroots organization created by Polish startup founders with the goal to help build better conditions for Polish startups by influencing policy-makers, educators, academics and media. Warsaw is one of the largest startup hubs in the CEE region. This was why Google launched their third European Campus in Warsaw, following Madrid and previously London in 2012. Poland has a few startup centres apart from its capital city, including Cracow, Poznan and Gdansk. Startup Poland hopes to highlight all those cities. The purpose of the Foundation Startup Poland is to create better conditions for the development of start-ups in Poland with local or international founders.

  betahaus | Sofia is a part of an international network with hubs in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and soon in Zurich, Lisbon and Barcelona. The first coworking space in Bulgaria is a fav place for shared work space and exciting networking events for freelancers and startup teams in Sofia - capital of Bulgaria and host city of WEBIT.FESTIVAL. The Bulgarian information technology industry is one of the fastest growing industries in this country. According to European Information Technology Observatory (EITO), the Bulgarian IT industry has been enjoying at a two-digit rate, and there are no signs that this growth will slow down anytime soon. In addition to this, Bulgaria has the second fastest broadband in the world after South Korea. Bulgaria outcompetes other EU member states by offering the best of both worlds and offers low cost opportunities for both companies and individuals. Bulgaria’s flat tax rate of 10% is undoubtedly exceptional from a EU perspective. The country’s strategic location is a huge benefit for startups with global ambitions. Sofia is  just an hour away by flight to Istanbul, Bucharest,  two hours from Berlin, Paris and Barcelona, three hours to London and four to Dubai. There are direct flight to Middle East through Dubai Airports,  comfortable transfers to some of the busiest airports in the world - Ataturk in Istanbul and Dubai International Airport, Doha - where you can basically choose a flight to every part of Asia and Africa. If you’re not convinced yet, that Bulgaria is the hottest place for building your company, come to WEBIT.FEST on 19th and 20th of April to see for yourself! *The startup party is set for 20th of April’s night in betahaus | Sofia.  

betahaus | Berlin 

Berlin is one of the best cities for startup founders in Europe, and at the same time cheaper than many of its European counterparts. According to the statistics a new start-up is founded every 20 minutes in Berlin and the industry is set to produce 100,000 new jobs by 2020.

If you need a space to work and spend nice time, you can find betahaus|Berlin in Kreuzberg - the fav place of creative minds in the city! Feel free to use the wifi, work, and meet people. Last November, officially was launched the betahaus|Academy: speciality courses in the fields of business & marketing, web & design, and crafts & DIY. If you’re “too cool cool for school”, join it! Everyone says, Sofia is the little sister of Berlin. The wall is down and Berlin meets Sofia at WEBIT.FEST'16...

 

Techhub  is the global community for tech entrepreneurs. They work with over 600 companies around the world to help them scale.

TechHub members can work, meet, collaborate, learn and have fun at any of our locations under our global membership. Its network enables members to work smarter, develop faster and increase their chances of startup success. It has programmes and spaces in London, Madrid, Warsaw, Riga, Bucharest, Bangalore and Swansea where we help startups go global.

Reaktor is a place for Warsaw-based startups and freelancer to work, collaborate and network. The Polish market  of 40 million residents seems big enough to scale a business even if you’re not looking to expand outside of the country. However, the situation get a different picture and the globally oriented business rise up in Warsaw, elevating the city up as one of the European startup-friendly capitals.

Reaktor was created in 2011 by a number of local startup founders in cool old-­fashioned house to be the place where people and ideas collide and where disruption is born. Overnight, the house became an epicenter of the Warsaw startup community.

Startup Hub Poland is a non-profit foundation, which aims to facilitate technological development in the CEE region and increase its global presence as a place where disruptive technologies appear. Their financing arm, StartVenture@Poland is a seed fund for technological projects at the early stages of development, which invests up to €50.000 in one round. The fund operates in  strategic partnership with Giza Polish Ventures – a Polish-Israeli venture capital fund and supported by the National Centre for Research and Development of Poland (NCBR). Visa and legislation support is available for founders outside the European zone.

The verticals of investment include Biotechnology in agriculture, Food processing, Innovative food distribution channel, Using information technologies to support the management of animal farms and plant nurseries, Automatics and robotics in agriculture, Biotechnology and Medical Devices New Materials and Nanotechnology, Big data , Artificial intelligence, natural language processing, algorithms, Knowledge management, Internet of Things, Mobile technologies in industrial applications, Corporate mobility.

WEBIT.FESTIVAL 2016 welcomes founder & CEO of Startup Hub Poland, Maciej Sadowski. Join his Investor Talk (webit.bg)

Innovation Nest is a seed/VC fund based in Krakow, which invests in early to Series A stage B2B technology companies with global focus. The investment range is from $25k up to $1M in startups across Europe and in collaboration with funds and angles from Europe and the US. The recently launched acceleration program named Growth!, based at the newly opened Campus Warsaw main goal was to accelerate startups from Central Eastern Europe that sell their products to business customers and already generate revenue.  If you are looking for fundraising from Innovation Nest, the right time will be: “between Seed and Series A funding, is one of the most tricky stages of startups’ growth. It seems things are going in the right direction, but in order to grow as expected, the founding team needs to move to another level – start scaling things that work and abandon things that don’t.”  

Starters Hub Istanbul is a unique platform based in Istanbul serving EMENA and CIS regions, providing startups with extensive know-how and network, multi-stage funding, hands-on mentorship and an inspiring workplace. The hub is the regional arm of Startupbootcamp’s accelerating program with no geographical or vertical limitations.

For 3 months, 10 selected startups are being provided with funding and incubation space along with intense mentoring. At the end of the program, the founders join Demo Day to pitch their product.

  Metavallon Greece is a model social enterprise that empowers and accelerates startups at the very early stages (€22.000 in pre-seed funding) in 4 month program.Through its three-stage program (Τhe Lab, The Accelerator, The Hub), Metavallon seeks to motivate talented individuals, expose them to experienced entrepreneurs, experts and investors, and provide them with the necessary resources to start their own high impact businesses. Its mission is to uplift the endeavors of active entrepreneurial spirits around the world and generate a powerful venturing movement in Greece and beyond. Verticals of the startups include Fintech, B2B & Enterprise, Big Data & Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality & Augmented Reality, Internet of Things, SaaS & Cloud services, Telecommunications & Mobile, Energy & Cleantech, Health & Biotech, Science.   H-Farm is an accelerator that does Seed and Early Stage Venture Investments. It is an innovative platform set up in 2005 to help young entrepreneurs launch new initiatives and support the digitalisation of Italian companies. "H-FARM Investment" is the division dedicated to the startup investments through three complementary ways: H-CAMP: Acceleration Program dedicated to Digital startups that operates in the “Made In Italy” sectors with a focus on B2B solutions where H-FARM has a word-class network. Each selected startup receives an investment in terms of Services (mentorship, workshops, tech partners, business network, demo day) and Cash. H-FARM Venture Fund provides direct and indirect investments in early-stage Italian startups (on the fields of SaaS, consumer internet, and B2B services) and in early-stage European startups with global ambitions in the fields of SaaS and consumer internet. WEBIT.FESTIVAL 2016 welcomes Maurizio Rossi,  co-founder of H-FARM Ventures. Join his Investor Talk (webit.bg)   BuildIT Hardware is a young, Estonian accelerator focusing only on the business of building, selling, and investing in hardware The accelerating program is a new 3 month long based in Estonia’s Tartu Science Park, plus a 1 month Seedcamp-style investor “roadshow” in the U.S., China and UK. Startups can apply from anywhere, though there is particular emphasis on Eastern Europe and Russia. Teams must have at least 2 members and preferably have (or be close to) a working prototype. In return for entering the program, Buildit invests €15,000 for 5-10% equity.   WHub.HK connects talent with startups and entrepreneurs with co-founders. As a profile-driven platform that showcases the team behind the startup, WHub lets startups share their company mission, products and current job openings. If you would like to get a job at a Hong Kong-based startup, Whub can help. Startup founders could receive support to get into top accelerators and to raise millions of dollars in seed funding. Startup Next Hong Kong is a Techstars Community Program and is run in a collaboration with W Hub. Application Deadline for 2016’s program is 22nd of March.  

Mojo Capital manages the European Digital Opportunities Fund that integrates investments in European Venture Capital funds, secondaries, co-investments and direct investments in startups focused on digital opportunities.

Mojo.capital was founded in 2014 by Matthias Ummenhofer, previously head of European Investment Fund's technology investment business to capitalise on the digital growth opportunity in Europe. Matthias is joining the speakers lineup of WEBIT.FESTIVAL this year, so startup founders could meet him in person during the Investors Talks Day (see our agenda on webit.bg).     Insight Venture Partners is an American venture capital fund based in New York. The firm focuses on growth-stage investments in businesses with technology, software and Internet-enabled, mobile and ecommerce verticals.  They have raised more than $13 billion and invested in more than 250+ companies. They has invested in companies such as Twitter, Tumblr, Flipboard, Quest Software, Jagex, Hootsuite. Insight Venture Partners is active globally with portfolio-company investments in 65 countries on six continents. At this year’s WEBIT.FESTIVAL you could meet Elodie Dupuy, who is Vice President at Insight Venture Partners based in NY. She pursues high growth internet , new media and SaaS companies in non-US markets, specifically Europe and Latin America.  Investors Talks Day at WEBIT.FEST could be found at webit.bg.      

Starburst Accelerator provides seed funding from the top business angels and venture capital firms dedicated to Aerospace, Defense and Security as well as access to the largest aerospace group stakeholders to get your first 1M$ contract. The accelerator program offers startups an opportunity to showcase their business to leading corporations in the aerospace, aviation and defense industries. American sponsors for the Starburst USA program so far include: Boeing, Panasonic Avionics, Millennium Space Systems, Raytheon and Booz Allen.

The program provides also access to office space located in the center of Paris and Los Angeles.

You can meet Starburst’s founder Francois Chopard at WEBIT.FESTIVAL’16.

  Runa Capital is a global technology-focused venture capital firm. It provides early-stage funding for cloud computing services, hosted services, virtualization tools, complex software, and IT solutions for fintech, education, healthcare, and public services. Runa Capital’s first fund, Runa Capital I, began with a $30 million initial commitment and reached $135 million by 2012. The company is now aiming to raise $200 million for Runa Capital II, focusing on investments in USA, European Union, Israel and Eastern Europe. Most recently the firm opened offices in San Francisco's SOMA district with plans on doing more investment in North America, as well as to better support the existing investments it has already made in US companies. Dmitry Chikhachev Co-founder and Managing Partner of the fund joins the speakers lineup at WEBIT.FEST this April.  You can meet him during the Investors Talks (webit.bg).

Intel Capital is a division of Intel Corporation, set up to manage Corporate venture capital, global investment, mergers and acquisitions. Intel Capital invests in a broad range of hardware, software, and services companies targeting computing and smart devices, cloud, datacenter, security, the Internet of Things, wearable and robotic technologies and semiconductor manufacturing.

Since 1991, Intel Capital has invested nearly US$11.6 billion in over 1,400 companies in 57 countries. The VC fund has 26 offices around the world. Countries include Belgium, Brazil, China, India,Germany, Ireland, Japan, Israel, Nigeria, Poland, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, UK, USA.

Marcin Hejka is a vice president at Intel Capital and managing director for Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) at Intel Corporation. He is responsible for leading Intel Capital's investment activity in the region, which also encompasses Russia.

You are welcome to meet him at WEBIT.FEST 2016, during the Investors Talks (webit.bg).

    EarlyBird is an international venture capital firm that invests across multiple stages,  ranging from early-stage to expansionary and growth stages with investment sizes between €200k and €20M. It manages around US$1 billion, as the firm is one of the largest European venture and growth capital investors and the largest outside of the UK, with offices in Berlin, Munich and Istanbul. Earlybird looks for investment opportunities with European DNA but global ambitions. The Health Tech Fund is oriented towards funding innovative medical technology companies, while the Earlybird Digital East Fund is focused on providing early stage equity capital to high-potential technology companies in Turkey and Central & Eastern Europe. The key interest areas of the fund are Consumer Internet, Enterprise Software and Tech-Enabled Services. Cem Sertoglu is an entrepreneur and venture capital investor, focused on technology ventures in Turkey and CEE. You are welcome to meet him at WEBIT.FEST 2016, during the Investors Talks (webit.bg).   Techstars METRO Accelerator  opened its doors  in October of 2015 and  announced the first class of startups taking part in its  programme. International teams from five countries moved into the offices of German Tech Entrepreneurship Center in Berlin. For three months, they benefited from the focused support of mentors as well as financial support to expand their business model internationally. The program supports Digital Transformation in restaurants, hotels and catering companies.  The first class, consisting of eleven international startup teams, presented at Demo Day in Berlin on the 28th of January, 2016. Each company participating is battling for up to €120,000 in investment capital and access to METRO’s resources, relationships, sales force, and a streamlined business development process to pour rocket-fuel on your innovative idea. Rob Johnson is a serial entrepreneur and investor. He is currently the Managing Director for Techstars in Berlin, Germany. Rob is also joining the Investors talks at WEBIT.FESTIVAL, so you can meet him in person.    Credo Ventures seeks entrepreneurs in Central and Eastern Europe who have a vision that extends beyond our regional borders to create global companies. Credo’s team of investors focuses on early stage companies in CEE across the information technology, internet, mobile and healthcare markets. The inaugural fund, Credo Stage 1, has raised €18M. In April 2015, Credo’s second fund, Credo Stage 2, was founded while raising €34M in the first closing. Founded in 2009, Credo Ventures is based in Prague, Czech Republic. Ondrej Bartos is co-founder and partner at Credo Ventures, as well speaker at WEBIT.FEST 2016. Join the Investors Talks (webit.bg).   SpeedUP Group is a leading group of venture funds, investing in enterprises in an early stage of development (seed, pre-revenue, early growth). Areas of our interest include enterprises and entrepreneurs in Central and Eastern Europe, who want to conquer the global market by utilizing their self-developed solutions. Depending on individual needs, potential for growth and project maturity, SpeedUp invests from $30K up to $2M. To get into their scanning, your company should be from areas such as: consumer internet, hardware, Software, Mobile, Digital ICT, Life Science, Health Care, Clean Tech, e-Commerce, IoT, MarTech, FinTech. Bartek Gola is the CEO & Managing Partner at SpeedUp Venture Capital Group. He is also joining the Investors talks at WEBIT.FESTIVAL’16, where you can meet and talk to him.   The Hub.hu is a new generation co-working environment that gives startups, enterpreneurs, freelancers, digital nomads, creatives, techies and micro-businesses the opportunity to work and collaborate in a creative, community focused atmosphere. In one of the most beautiful cities of Europe - Budapest, the startup culture of Hungary is emerging and vibrant. The success stories of Hungarian companies, such as Ustream, Prezi and LogMeIn are a big inspiration to the young local entrepreneurs and helped to attract investors attention.   iTech Capital was established in 2011 in Riga and today’s portfolio is comprised of equity injections up to US$10 million per deal in IT companies operating in Central and Eastern Europe, Asia and USA. The Average deal size is US$5 million. iTech global investment strategy lies in the following sectors: - Online advertising technologies: online marketing platforms and tools for website promotion, context advertising and real-time bidding - TMT (Technology, Media and Telecommunications): software, software-on-demand solution providers, e-gaming and e-entertainment, IT outsourcing - E-commerce, e-processing and e-banking, FinTech, BigData & Processing, OnlineTravel - New Media: infoweb portals, social networks, e-advertising channels At WEBIT.FEST’16 you could meet Gleb Davidyuk, who is Managing Partner of iTech Capital.     Speedinvest is an early stage seed and Series A fund based in Vienna, Austria. With funds of approx. EUR 100M and offices in Vienna and Silicon Valley it targets early stage companies out of Central Europe in the internet and mobile sector. Speedinvest is the biggest VC fund ever raised in Austria, as the fund is raised from more than 100 entrepreneurs and private investors. Specifically, they aim to build a bridge between Europe and Silicon Valley. Their US team works as outsourced strategic and biz dev operations for their investments, with the goal of accelerating growth and maximizing valuation. WEBIT.FESTIVAL 2016 welcomes Stefan Klestil, who is partner at Speedinvest. Stefan is responsible for FinTech investments across EMEA. Join his Investor Talk (webit.bg)   Seedinvest is an equity crowdfunding platform that connects startups with investors online. SeedInvest has focused on building liquidity in the platform by attracting high-net-worth individuals, family offices and venture capital firms. Currently the platform partners with Angel Investing website Gust. Notable funding rounds on SeedInvest have included Atlas Wearables ($1.4M raised), Snapcard ($1.5M raised), Virtuix ($3M raised), Vengo Labs ($2M raised) and Knightscope($1.5M raised). SeedInvest founders Ryan Feit and James Han were involved in consultation with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and in the United States Congress for the passing of the JOBS Act. Ryan Feit is the CEO and Co-Founder of SeedInvest. Ryan was instrumental in the passage of the 2012 JOBS Act, which changed 80-year-old U.S. securities laws to make it possible for entrepreneurs to raise capital over the Internet. He is joining the stage of WEBIT.FEST 2016, as part of the Investors Talks Day (webit.bg).    

It’s less than two months till the date of WEBIT.FESTIVAL 2016 (19-20th of April) and it’s been 8 years since the first Webit event took place in Sofia. If we have to give you an comparison of  WEBIT.FESTIVAL this year and how important it will be for the region, the closest metaphor is that 2016 for us is what the historic landing of Falcon 9  was for SpaceX! Europe is becoming second-tier player not only to America but India and China and we are confident we can help in getting back in the first row. Because of people such as the founders of Telerik, BitDefender, Chaos Group, Rimac Auto … Sofia and Eastern Europe has a lot to offer and help and it is time to be heard and involved in the digital future of Europe. The endless work and dedication are making a difference and as our Chairman, Mr. Plamen Russev says “Never give up is not a cliche”. The constant efforts to improve the environment that we live in and to promote business making here have recently gathered us with Betahaus Sofia. So, here we are, creating our own bro-code and collaborating to cement the city as hub of entrepreneurship. While we are getting ready to press the start on 19th of April, the speakers lineup is being announced,  so we have decided to give you closer look at some of them. You can comment to share your thought and to say Say “Hi” to:   : #1 Brian Collins CMO, AngelHack @LifeofaBrian - place for anyone with an idea   Brian Collins is the Chief Marketing Officer of San Francisco-based AngelHack, the world’s largest and most diverse global hackers and code creators community, who “invent the new and make change happen”. Back in 2011, their first hackathon event in San Francisco gathered 25 developers. Today AngelHack’s community is over 50,000 in 96 cities worldwide. Their target audience is not just programmers or people who can code—it’s anyone with an idea. Brian is always traveling to different hackathons interacting with hackers, so we decided to give him an opportunity to meet and network with the geeks in Bulgaria in advance. He will be speaking at WEBIT.FESTIVAL, where you can meet in person and share your ideas. WEBIT: You say you’re travelling a lot to meet developers around the world. Will it be the first time for you in Bulgaria in April and who would you like to meet with at WEBIT.FESTIVAL? Brian: This is not just my first time in Bulgaria, but my first time in South East Europe. In my travels last year everyone was telling me about how Bulgaria and CEE in general have been making huge strides in tech over the last few years. I’d love to meet anyone who’s excited about building out their tech communities.  AngelHack works with individuals to help build a foundational tech community in their city and companies to build communities globally.   WEBIT: Is there any difference between hackers from the valley and those from Europe? Brian:European hackers share a lot in common with our South East Asia hackers.  Their projects tend to be very specific to problems they see in their neighborhoods and communities every day.  Example: one of our Eastern European winning teams from last year, AppKeep, created an app that automatically collects the manuals of all of your in-home appliances.  It can then give you the best repair options should they break down. Hackers in the Valley tend to be much more focused on larger solutions. Our Silicon Valley team this year, Air Quail, was creating hardware to crowd source air quality metrics down to your street or over a whole continent. Neither is superior to the other: they’re different ways to focus on problem solving.  The key is: does it work? And if so, how can we expand it?   WEBIT: What about Eastern Europe? Brian: I had a college roommate who was a Bulgarian coder.  He was generally quiet,  but one of the things I remember the most was when it was time to work on a project he would lock himself into his room for two or three days.  He was essentially throwing one man hackathons! That’s always been my image of Eastern Europe hackers - sometimes quiet but never afraid to get their hands dirty on the tough coding.   WEBIT: AngelHack is hosting a hackathon in Sofia in June. Why and what’s the idea behind it? Brian: This is our 9th Global Series, but our first time in Bulgaria. Our hackathons are a ton of fun for developers, designers, or entrepreneurs and the winning team gets an invite to our HACKcelerator program.  This lets them turn their hackathon idea into a start up reality. Our theme for the series is Anyone.Can. Code. One of the things we hear over and over again are the incredible stories of how people learned how to code.  For some they begin at 3 with basic logic.  For others they taught themselves much later in life to make a change.  Code has no gender, no age, and no cultural limitations. Our series is broken into the tech hubs that everyone expects (London, San Francisco, Singapore), and the up and coming communities (Sofia, Lima, Lviv).  We work really closely with our ambassadors like Rumen to help create events that bring the community together and help them network and create something amazing.   Betahaus: What are your observations about Bulgaria being part of the global entrepreneurial generation? Brian: Tech is moving from finding global solutions to everyday problems, to finding localized solutions to neighborhood problems.  I’m excited to see Bulgaria entering the entrepreneurial landscape, to see what problems are most important for them to solve. One of the things at AngelHack we see is that the same problems get tackled over and over again in hackathons.  But not all of them are successful.  Often it’s the team that has the most common connection to the problem at hand who can attack it in just the right way.  A team in New york may tackle an idea, but it’s the team in Kuala Lumpur who actually solves it. I can’t wait to see what problems Bulgaria is going to solve in the coming years.   WEBIT: Did you know anything about the tech hub of Sofia before being invited to speak here? Brian: Sadly nothing about Sofia specifically.  But I’m excited to learn more while I’m there!   *Applications for Dev Summit access: http://www.webit.bg/dev.php For more info: Yanita@eacad.eu  

Mobile payments right now are incredibly complicated and figuring out how to do them has been a great challenge. However, once we figured that out the next challenge we are facing is how to persuade consumers to use them. Speedinvest is an early stage venture fund in Vienna. They invest in countries like Turkey, Slovenia, and hopefully soon in Bulgaria. Investing in FinTech is like a rollercoaster, with disruptions going on in every field, like trading, cryptocurrency, payment and many other fields. It really doesn’t matter which area you will choose, there is room for startups in all of them. This is because big players aren’t able to cope with the development speeds of the technology, they are not flexible enough. There are exceptions to this rule, but startups are generally more able to grasp the new trends in technology and use it to create a new field. As in every other startup market you need to create traction with your first product, or you will not get too far. FinTech is different, however, from other verticals, because it is a regulated business. When you start one you have to choose to either partner with a licensed institution or get a license yourself. Both of these solutions take time, and getting a license yourself costs a lot of money. One piece of advice to take away is that investing in teams made up only of experts is not a good idea. It looks very tempting, but those people are typically not very good founders. Really good founders can learn about every field and become an expert in the field in a very short period of time. The ways Speedinvest deals with the founders it finances is creating bonds with them, not just giving them money. In order to be successful in the field, there has to be mutual trust and respect between founder and investor. The investment is emotional as well as financial.

 "In the end, it is all about great founders. No matter what and how much you invest, you need a great founder team in order to succeed" shared on the stage of CEEDS'15 Stefan Klestil - General Partner, SpeedInvest.

The area of payments has never been so interesting before. In the recent years, more has happened in the area than ever before. All of this is because of the mobile phones and the Internet. The biggest change in the area has been the change of the ecosystem. With the raise of new big and small players in the mobile industry, the payments area has grown bigger and bigger. Another factor for this progress is the fact that retail and customers are ready to try to use new ways of payment, like contactless payments and some mobile paying systems, like Uber. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have also influenced the way payments are changing. A big factor for payments is regulation. The regulation coming from Europe has changed everything, leaving companies like Visa on the look for new ways to solve the problems that arise. This, combined with other factors, has led to the creation and spread of digital payments and digital currencies. It has also helped the development of mobile payments and other simpler, smarter and more secure solutions. We have got to a point where paying with card is not more expensive than paying with cash, and are now seeing how more and more businesses start accepting cards as a way of paying. Technologies like contactless have enabled whole cities like London to run their transport system without the need of cash. Another big thing that has changed is the online check-out experience. We see new mobile wallets coming in, and the security getting better and better. The development in the whole area is driven mainly by the needs of the costumer for better experience better security and ease of use. An important issue that has to be resolved is payments getting in the way of buying. That happens when, in order to purchase something, the costumer needs to go through a hassle to make the payment. We also need to find a balance between security, collecting data and ease of use. We want to receive as much data as possible from every payment, without exposing any sensible data and without forcing the consumer to use an obstructive technology. Digital technology has not only changed the commerce value chain, but it has also introduced new parts to it, creating new solutions for the problems we have, but also  new problems that need to be solved. Big players like Facebook, can actually have influence over the whole payment system we are seeing. In addition, digital payments make it easier for companies to tailor their offers to each consumer.

"The biggest and most used system for payments of course is Visa. The company has over 500 million cards and 15% of all the money that goes around Europe goes through a Visa card. Bulgaria has one of the lowest usage on Visa in Europe – just one out of every twenty euros is paid via Visa. But how that such a big company react to all the changes that arise? They have changed their whole investment portfolio, betting more on partnerships with new players, and less on long-term investments. Visa is working closely with many banks and big currencies  in order to completely eliminate cash as a form of payment, making it easier than ever for everyone to pay for the things they want and get better and better offers", said at CEEDS'15 in April Krassimira Raycheva - Country Lead Bulgaria, Visa Europe.

"On a global scale we have around $400bn in cashless transactions per year. Even though this area is already huge, it is still growing rapidly. One of the reasons for that is the desire of consumers to pay digitally as it is easier and more secure. Another is the fact that there is still a vast majority of businesses that don’t accept digital payments" said on the stage of CEEDS'15 in April Konstantin Wolff, co-founder of Payleven.

The UK for example has 64% of businesses that don’t accept any form of digital payments, even card payments. In France, huge amount of the payments are done by cheque, a technology which is too old for the world we live in. Payleven’s mission is to enable as many SMEs as possible to accept card payments from their customers. There are lots of studies proving that people are ready to spend much more money when buying products and donating with card payments. Having this in mind, it is no surprise that more and more business would want to accept card payments. However, there still isn’t a solution that can cater to their needs. What Payleven does, is offering SMEs the ability to accept card payments with a simple smartphone or tablet in combination with a chip and pin card reader. This replicated the functionality of the traditional card reader. The solution can be used by any SMEs, no matter what area they are in. The problems that need to be solved when looking at SMEs and card payments, can be put in three main categories – operating model, go-to-market and the technology used. The first one is the operating model – if you want to get a traditional card reader you have to wait for 6-8 weeks and sign tons of paperwork. If you use Payleven’s solution this down-time plummets to a single day. Customer support is also a big thing – the company proactively finds problems that may arise, and is prepared to help the businesses. Technology-wise, a lot of the cost of card payments is gone. The cost of the card reader has gone down from 600 to 80 euros, assuming you already have a smartphone or a tablet. Lastly, the payment system is changed. Normally, you sign a contract, forcing you to pay a monthly fee just in order to be live. Payleven has changed that to a pay as you go model, where you only pay for what you use. SMEs can also stop anytime if they don’t like the product. This, however changes the way devices are sold, which led Payleven to the idea to simply sell their card reader at the likes of Metro, where the business owner can just grab it off the shelf, go online, register and become ready to accept card payments. Overall, the company is offering a much more flexible and cheaper solution, that small business can start using today, without signing a contract and paying huge fees every month.

In order to become a successful business entrepreneur, you need a good business idea, and good ideas come to the right side of your brain, the one dealing with dreams and art. However, becoming good at that field, means you should not only have great dreams but also great execution plan. We shouldn’t ask ourselves how to become an entrepreneur, but how to become a successful entrepreneur. In order to be successful, you have to be smart and you have to bring something new to the market. Spending the whole budget only on marketing, without offering anything new to the consumer will not make the consumers go to your business. In order to persuade the consumers to start using your products, you have to give them an incentive in the form of innovation. If you offer the consumers something new during your marketing campaign you will get them to try your product. This is just the beginning of the journey which will result in you getting all the consumers. The difference between an innovator and an inventor is that the innovator knows how to sell the products they invent. After the global financial crisis, whole governments are sporting innovation not invention. Governments don’t just need intelligent people, they need people who can create new jobs for the population. It is very important to first innovate and then set up the company. Many people fail because they try to set up a company before having an innovative idea, meaning they are spending their money before they make it. Once you have your successful product and you know that consumers are ready to pay money for it, you have to start thinking about branding. Every time you sell your product you are also selling your brand. Your brand is marketed through the same campaigns that market your product. If consumers enjoy buying your product and using your brand you have successfully set up a brand. When you have successfully set up your business and brand you have to make sure that no one can innovate in the product you are making. When you do that competitors will be left with the only choice to buy the franchise rights from you and you become a big product family. After the last stage, the management stage, you have to choose if you are yourself an employee or the CEO of the company. If you decide to work as an employee of your own company, you will have no time for any other business and ideas. During the leadership stage you have to convert your business into a real one. In order for a business to reach the expected results, it has to be professionally run, which means you will have to hire an external person to act as the CEO of the company, and you yourself can become the chairman of the board. Once you get to that point, you can pick a startup you like and become their angel investor. That means you use your money, network and know how to invest in the business. In exchange you get a certain percent of the company shares, or part of the revenue. This and other motivational speech, you can hear if you subscribe for the Webit official YouTube channel HERE.

Bitcoin has gone the way of every new technology – big players shame it at first, ridicule it, but soon new business, markets and even whole industries emerge in order to commercialize it. Now, according to many of the biggest names, like Bill Gates, Eric Smith and Al Gore have taken a stand for it. However, when we speak about Bitcoin we have to answer a question: what problems does it solve, and why is it so good? Researchers have tried for decades to find a way to make all the machines on a given network to agree on the state of something, but it wasn’t until 2009 when Bitcoin was introduced, that a practical solution was found. The concept of the blockchain was created. The blockchain is a public journal of every transaction made with Bitcoin, ever since it was found.

"This blockchain is shared between all the machines, so if someone tries to cheat and create fake Bitcoins, everyone on the network can actually see that they have no legitimate history. Using this technology, everyone can send pieces of digital property to one another, without the need of a centralized structure or an expensive middle man," said at CEE Digital Summit Lasse Birk Olesen - Chief Product Officer of Coinify.

Among the many problems that Bitcoin solves is reducing transaction fees and pretty much eliminating fraud. According to Golden Sax, card payment transactions cost around 125 billion euro to business every year. In addition to that another 80 billion euro is lost due to card fraud. The reason we have these huge numbers is that payment cards were invented in 1950s and never really changed much in terms of security. This technology was never designed for the Internet. On the other hand we have Bitcoin, which is designed specifically to exist in the era of Internet. There are more and more businesses that accept Bitcoin payments. One of the biggest advantages is the smaller cost of Bitcoin transactions – every transaction costs you 2 euro cents, no matter if you are sending 100 euros or 1 million euros. Bitcoin payments are also easier than card payments – instead of looking for your card and entering tons of numbers when trying to buy something, you just click a button, enter your password and you’re done. By accepting Bitcoin payments you can also get paid from any country in the world, because Bitcoin is global. For example, sending money from Uganda will mean losing around 9% of the money in every transaction. According to researches, 50% of the people don’t have a bank account, meaning they can’t do digital transactions and that their money is in danger. However, Bitcoin will enable these people to send and receive money internationally, and even apply for loans from other countries. Another great use of Bitcoin is crowdfunding. If you use a platform like Kickstarter, you pay around 8% of the raised money to the website, but in return you get a secure platform that guarantees the investors to get their money back if the project is not fully funded. However, you can do the same with Bitcoin, using self-enforcing contracts. A contract can be programmed to do a certain action under certain conditions. For example, if you get a given amount of money for a given time the money would be transferred, otherwise it would be given back to the investors. This is better than using Kickstarter, because it eliminates the middle man and it has much lesser fees. There aren’t many countries that regulate Bitcoin, but some of the ones that do are USA, Germany and Sweden. One factor that eases regulation is the fact that Bitcoin is far from anonymous. In the blockchain every transaction is linked to an account and a name, meaning that every transaction can be easily tracked back to the sender. Coinify has helped on several occasion for the arrests of criminals, using the blockchain. Even though Bitcoin is still volatile, this is a normal trend for any new currency or product and is one that will go away with time. We have seen the volatility of the currency go down and we can be sure it will settle down even further in the coming years. Wanna learn more about the bitcoin and the future of that currency, watch the archive of CEEDS'15 HERE.

"Intel is not just the largest semiconductor companies in the world, but is also one of the largest technology investors globally", said at CEE Digital Summit by Webit Marcin Hejka, VP & MD EEMEA, Intel Capital.

Looking back at how technology evolved to get to the point of IoT, we see that it all started in the 60s with mainframes. It then moved over to client-server architecture, went through web, cloud technology and got to the Internet of Things we are looking at now. The number of connected devices has also increased through the years, starting from several millions mainframes and reaching around 40 billion devices in the next few years. One of the biggest adopters of IoT in the next years, is the energy sector. The number of points where energy is being created is growing significantly. Gathering the right data, processing it and giving it back can enable energy providers to become more and more efficient, eventually getting to a point where we have zero or even negative cost of electricity. The other big area is, of course IT. The introduction of 4G, 5G is also related with millions of new devices and the topology of networks becomes more and more complicated, which can raise a lot of new problems. This can easily be solved with the introduction of self-organized networks, able to solve the problems themselves. We are also seeing devices that can operate up to 10 years without a charging. We are talking about sensors that can be embedded into roads and operate for a decade without charging. The key component of the IoT is the server part, or the cloud. The sensors and devices are becoming cheaper and, as a result, more popular. All the sensors do is gather data constantly. One passenger plane can collect a terabyte of data for the duration of a single flight. However, there is not enough intelligence on the client side to process that. This leads to an immense growth in the cloud sector. Eventually, all the data is ending in the cloud, being processed by big data software. There are already systems which are specialized in analyzing huge databases of unstructured data and extracting intelligence. This intelligence can then be translated directly into useful actions by enterprises. Going forward, IoT will lead us to having intelligence everywhere around us. The systems will be adjusted to us. We are going in the direction of driverless cars, and even beyond that. Actually in many places the limitations are not technological, but legal. For example, in many countries it is illegal to drive a driverless car on public roads. However, you can tell your car to get out of the garage and get in front of your door to make it easier for you to leave your house. Intel has been very active in this space. On top of investment the company is also supplying some devices and technologies that can be used in the sector. These technologies include the super small mother board that can enable the smallest of devices. The company has also introduced a computer platform the size of a button, that can be used in various devices. Intel also produces health trackers, smart watches. Intel has been investing in roughly 100 tech companies every year. Their areas of focus have been changing over time and now consists mainly of datacenter technologies and software, as well as internet, media and education technology. If you've missed to hear Marcin Hejka at CEE Digital Summit by Webit this spring, please watch the video archive of the event in the official Webit YouTube Channel.