Tag: Discussion

The developed economies of the world are rapidly transforming into Gigabit societies of ultra-fast connections, while our lives are increasingly influenced by phenomenons such as AI, VR, IOT and robotics. The processes we were discussing during Webit.Festival years ago are the reality of today. We have already passed the 4 billion mark of internet users globally, while more than 80% of the population of Europe is using the web on a daily basis. This exponential digital transformation of our everyday life require some major system changes that will shape the Infrastructure 4.0 and will enable people and businesses to reap the benefits of all the new opportunities that are presented to them. According to Gartner, the EU tech spending for software products will increase by 7.23% on a yearly basis for the next half decade, while the spending for IT services will reach $38.6 billion in 2022. This, among many other topics, will be discussed during the Innovate! & Plenary Session of this year’s Webit.Festival Europe - the largest event for innovations and entrepreneurship in this part of the world. Experts believe that 5G networks will be rolled out for consumers and enterprise leaders from 2020, when the compatible telecom equipment and devices are available. The new 5G network will use radio spectrum four times as efficiently as the old 4G. This will be a huge factor that will help us meet the growing demand for mobile data. The larger demand comes from the rise of IOT devices and the fact that far more things than just our smartphones are and will be connected to the internet. “The question of how we can speed up infrastructure delivery and improve asset utilization has never been more important. By 2025, 60% of the world’s population will live in cities. Instead of traffic-congested cities with unhealthy levels of pollution, we need to create environments that are good for people and businesses”, says the CTO and Managing Board Member of Siemens Roland Bursch in his recent article. While the development of 5G networks is crucial to our future infrastructure, it could also pose a huge security risk for our information resources. Recently the US authorities expressed their concerns that Huawei 5G networks might be used by the Chinese government for espionage - both on military and corporate level. The Trump administration sees this as part of a new arms race, where the winner would gain an economic, intelligence and military edge for a better part of the century. The fact that many US allies refused to ban the Chinese company from 5G networks caused a huge diplomatic rift inside NATO countries that will unfold in the next two years. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the major steps that European policy makers and corporate leaders will need to take to create a secure job market for us and for the generations to come. During Innovate! & Plenary Session you will get the chance to listen to top enterprise, science and policy leaders, such as the Serial Entrepreneur Mark Cuban, the Airbus Defense and Space CEO Dirk Hoke, the Senior Parther at McKinsey & Co Paul Willmott, The VP of Amazon Web Services Sandy Carter and VP of Amazon Paul Misener, the EU Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society Mariya Gabriel, the Deputy Director-General of World Trade Organization Yonov Frederick Agah and many others. Here you can see a full list of the confirmed speakers at Webit.Festival, while here you can get all the information you need about the tickets for the event.

At Endeavour's Dare to Scale Rosen Plevneliev - the president of Bulgaria 2012-2017, Fernando Fabre - president of Enveavor Global, Vassil Terziev - Co-founder of Telerik Acacdemy had a panel discussion about the value about Entrepreneurial Ecosystem, moderated by Plamen Russev - Chairman of WEBIT Foundation.

Strengths to focus on and weaknesses to work on

The discussion went through 3 stages - Bulgaria, Region and Global. Vassil Terziev took over the first stage going through the last 10 years of developing an entrepreneurial spirit in Bulgaria and bringing all the components of a working Ecosystem together. They include people, events which gather several thousand people together talking about the future. New and new formats are coming to Bulgaria every year. "The growth is a function not only of time, but also of communication and aligning the economic interests. In order something to be sustainable it has to make sense for everybody involved. And this is what is still missing."  - mr. Terziev said, but staying still optimistic about what the Technology Ecosystem that's being built can do for the other sectors in Bulgaria.

It's a kind of magic

"I believe in magic big time. We need the magic of giving back."  mr. Plamen Russev We already have the Ecosystem startups and they are growing but do we need to focus on scale ups more? "They will make Bulgaria a better place, Through WEBIT, through Enveavor and other formats we will build those scale ups who will give back to the community." We need an ecosystem where every single person grows within the idea that he or she has to give back to the community – like the Israerli ecosystem. “You can’t say “I’ve done enough, now it’s time to give back” – no, you give back all the time. ”

The Local Heroes

Mr. Rosen Plevneliev talked about the ambition of Bulgaria and how he shared his thoughts with several entrepreneurs in the Silicon Valley. “You are as big as your dreams are, not as big as your territory is. And to be globally strong, we need to be locally strong. This is what you, the local heroes are doing right now.”

A map of ecosystems

Mr. Fernando Fabre took the audience on a world tour of the Ecosystems – from Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Silicon Valley, New York to Tel Aviv, Beirut and so on. He shared his opinion that it all goes down to inspiration. Big entrepreneurs inspire others – they grow and do the same – thus multiplying the mindset. “You call it giving back, Local heroes, I call it multiplying effect these are three terms that are exactly the same.” Webit Foundation commits its annual funds to foster the development of the startup and innovation ecosystems in the regions our global events take place. Founders Games is the startup competition in the program of Webit.Festival Europe. During the event we not only provide free grant for startups to get a free expo table, free festival tickets and opportunity to meet unparalleled selection top enterprise leaders from all around the world + investors, but also an opportunity to WIN €200 000 seed investment! Find out more about the Founder games here.