Tag: Webit.Festival Europe

Artificial Intelligence and Robotics are probably the two technologies that will create the most dramatic change in the way we live in the next several decades. In recent years we have experienced huge advancements in both fields and we are on the brink of their mass involvement in our everyday lifes. While the inclusion of robots still may sound futuristic to many of us, AI is already taking its place for both corporate and domestic use. Personal asistants, such as Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri are part of the daily life of millions and this is just the beginning. During Webit.Festival Europe you will be able to witness demonstrations of amazing technologies in the fields for Mobility, Robotics and AI. Here are some of them: Harmony presented by Guile Lindroth - Realbotix, CTO Time: 14th May, 14:30-14:40 at Innovate Stage The first companion robot with advanced AI. The unique machine has a human-synthetic skin, synced eyes, lip synced mechanics, articulated neck, changeable face and customizable apps eBee presented by Jean-Thomas Celette - senseFly, MD Time: 15th May, 11:39-11:49 at Innovate Stage The professional’s fully-autonomous mapping drone is able to capture high-resolution aerial photos tou can transform into accurate orthomosaics (maps) & 3D Models. Augmented Reality presented by Prof. Shafi Ahmed - Medical Realities, Chief Medical Officer Time: 14th May, 16:22-16:32 at Innovate Stage The Medical Realities Platform delivers high-quality surgical training using Virtual and Augmented Reality. It is a technological powerhouse designed to deliver realism and immersion. Hoverbike presented by Oriol Rafart - Malloy Aeronautics, CEO Time: 15th May: 17:17-17:27 at Innovate Stage The Hoverbike can deliver heavy aid, people, and equipment over building, rivers and mountains autonomously at the push of a button - cheap, safe and reliably. Furhat presented by Samer Al Moubayed - Furhat Robotics, CEO Time: 15th May, 09:52-10:07 at Innovate Stage The social robot that communicates with us humans with self learning social skills. GET presented by Leonid Plekhanov - GET, CEO & President Time: 15th May, 15:52-16:02 at Innovate Stage Wireless power network that enables battery-powered drones to recharge while still in flight FlytCycle predented by Ansel Misfeldt - FlytAerospace, Founder Time: 14th May, 17:23-17:33 at Innovate Stage Hoverbike that can traverse any terrain just a couple of feet off the ground Cybershoes presented by Michael Bieglmayer - Cybershoes, CEO Time: 14th May, 14:30-14:40 at Innovate Stage The only shoes for walking in VR that won’t let you bounce into a wall EnduroSat presented by Raycho Raychev - EnduroSat, Founder Time: 15th May, 17:17-17:27 at Innovate Stage EnduroSat provides simpler access to space for visionary business customers, scientists and technologists. It is a new type of interconnected and decentralized space infrastructure. During the event you will get the chance to listen to top enterprise, science and policy leaders, such as the Airbus Defence and Space CEO Dirk Hoke, the Senior Parther at McKinsey & Co Paul Willmott, the 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. Check out the full agenda of Webit.Festival Europe here 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.

Two years ago cryptocurrencies took the world by storm, which made Blockchain the new buzzworld of businesses around the world. Today, we can almost certainly say that Bitcoin’s price will not return to almost $20 000, but this does not mean that Blockchain was all part of the natural boom and bust cycle. In fact, the amazing technology will be a bigger part of our future than many can predict. We are hearing more and more about fintech, virtual tokens, digital assets, cryptocurrencies (not just the ones we already know), smart contracts and initial coin offerings. Each of these concepts rely on Blockchain technology. Blockchain has the potential to influence every aspect of the global economy and its applications are already developing faster than most governments and regulators can manage. Some countries like Bermuda has already made significant regulatory advances gathering international attention. In October 2018 the logal government has awarded the first certification for an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) under the island nation’s new regulatory regime for crypto and blockchain businesses. The legislation require ICO issuers to provide detailed information about all persons involved in the process. The future of Blockchain will be among the main topics of Webit.Festival Europe 2019 - the largest Digital & Tech event in the continent. On 14th of May at the Industry Stage the guests of the event will be able to hear predictions for the development of this amazing technology in the next 10 years from some of the best in the business. Blockchain has highlighted a critical aspect of the way data is going to work in the coming decades, and that is a world where data will be ever increasingly distributed. Dubai has already vowed to replace all government systems with Distributed ledger technology based digital structure by the end of next year. This indicates that DLT will only grow over time. One of the main obstacles before the mass blockchain implementation will be the standartization and interoperability among different blockchains. The development of open standard will be the thing that will bring true benefits for the consumer of enterprise. Experts predict that by 2030, most governments around the world will create or adopt some form of virtual currency. Despite of the fail in Bitcoin prices, cryptocurrencies have many advantages compared to the traditional alternatives. They are more efficient, provide reduced settlement times and offer increased traceability. Cryptocurrency can also be backed by real assets, similar to fiat currency, and its price can be artificially manipulated by numerous controls. In the short term, government-based cryptocurrency will become an area of experimentation and explorations, led mostly by developing nations with unstable economies and weak institutions. Come to Webit.Festival Europe to learn about the latest trends in Blockchain from top level experts. During the talks at Industry Stage you will be able to listen to global leaders, such as the Chief Marketing Officer of Tokyo Chapger Government Blockchain Association, Kohei Kurihara, the Co-Founder and CTO of Cindicator, Yuri Lobyntsev, the Global Ambassador of Bitfury, Marc Taverner, the Partner at Blockchain Rookies, Jon Walsh, the investor Alexander Shulgin, the Founding Partner at SpaceFund, Rick Tumlinson, the VP for Global Business Services at IBM, Johan van den Arend Schmidt and many others. Check out the full agenda of Webit.Festival Europe here 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.

Within less than a week, Sofia will host the biggest startup event in the world - the Founders Games, part of the agenda of Webit.Festival Europe 2019. Our team chose the top 200 among 4000 candidates from all over the world. They will all be able to compete for the big prize - an investment of up to €200 000. But the price is just a small part of the opportunities the startups get with their participation in the festival. They will not only be able to present their work to 10 000 Webit visitors, but also impress over 500 potential investors. The event strengthens the role of Sofia as a Digital Capital - a title that Forbes gave the city in 2016 after Webit.Festival. This year 27 of the major European cities are competing to host Webit. The winner will be announced during this year’s event on 14th and 15th of May. In the latest edition of the Founders Games you can see a total of 9 startups coming to Sofia from the Silicon Valley. This is another indication that over the years Webit has succeeded in establishing itself and Bulgaria as a technological destination. Even companies that are created in the world’s center of investment are inclined to travel thousands of kilometers to be part of the event. Webit provides its startups with event tickets, exhibition spaces and an unprecedented opportunity to show their business to top audiences. Through the years, Founders Games became an investment platform for matchmaking hand-picked early-stage/post seed stage startups and Round A scaleups with investors, corporates and media. Webit was among the first in the world (11 years ago) to start connecting the startup and the enterprise worlds. We were the first to provide grants (over €1 million yearly) to selected startups. A total of 65% of all startups participating in the Founders Games through the years receive the necessary funding up to 6 month after Webit. At the same time the mortality rate is just 30%, compared to an average of 95% failures in the startup sector. “I am proud of the fact that we are changing the image of Sofia and Bulgaria all over the world. So far, 9 Silicon Valley based startups (and 4000 from around the world) have applied for the Founders Games”, said the executive chairman of Webit.Foundation dr. Plamen Russev. Webit.Foundation is more than just speaking, more than just judging. We wish to provide startups with the best tools to help them sell their idea with the encouragement and guidelines provided by our speakers. 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.

In years of unprecedented technological advancements our societies are realizing more and more that our development as species comes with huge cost for the environment. For the last several decades we are talking a lot about the human effects on climate, but recently there is another issue that is grabbing our attention - the huge problem with plastic pollution. Plastics are durable, light and versatile. However, they take up to 400 years to decompose. This will affect people’s lives for the next 16 generations. Our excessive use of plastics is impacting ocean health and biodiversity. By 2050, there could be more plastics in the ocean than fish by weight. According to WWF, 91% of all plastics used on Earth are not recycled. Their production uses as much fossil fuel as airlines. 99% of plastics are contributing to climate change. Almost all marine animals are under threat А recent study, published in Marine Pollution Bulletine, shows that fisheries, aquaculture, recreational activities and global wellbein are all negatively affected by plastics. The estimated decline in the benefits humans derive from oceans is between 1% and 5%. The resulting cost in such benefits, known as marine ecosystem value is up to $2.5 trillion a year. The topic of our sustainable future and the decisions that enterprises and policy makers need to make in order to leave a better world for the future generations will be among the main points of discussion during the upcoming Webit.Festival Europe - the largest Digital & Tech event in Europe. At the start of 2019 the EU Parliament approved a law banning a wide range of single-use plastic items, such as straws, cotton buds and cutlery, by 2021. The proposition was supported by 560 Members of the Parliament against 35. They also agreed a target to collect and recycle 90% of beverage bottles by 2029. “Europe is setting new and ambitious standards, paving the way for the rest of the world”, the European Commission’s first vice-president Frans Timmermans, who is responsible for sustainable development said. Under the new European law, tobacco companies will be required to cover the costs for the collection of cigarette butts and manufacturers of fishing gear will also have to pay for the retrieval of any plastic nets that have been left at sea. The private sector is also coming in line with the global initiatives. Last month, Etihad Airways made its first fligh without any single-use plastics on board. According to the company, this marks the first time an airline in the region has undertaken such challenge. The move is part of Etihad’s overall strategy to reduce single-use plastics in its organization by 80% by the end of 2022. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the steps that world has to make to build its sustainable future. During the event you will get the chance to listen to top enterprise, science and policy leaders, such as the Airbus Defence and Space CEO Dirk Hoke, the Senior Parther at McKinsey & Co Paul Willmott, the 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.

Next several years of our development as species will be marked by technological advancements in fields such as Artificial Intelligence and Robotics. Many believe, that they will completely transform our societies, while others are concerned by the unprecedented threats that may come with this. Nearly 5 years ago one of the brightest human minds, the astrophysicist prof. Stephen Hawking, warned us that AI could end mankind. During an interview with BBC, he said that the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. Hawking stated that the primitive forms of AI developed so far have already proved very useful, but he feared the consequences of creating something that can match or surpass humans. In the same interview he said the the potential benefits of the technology are huge, listing eradication of war, disease and poverty as main goals. His concerns are reflected in the report of the US national security think tank Center for New American Security (CNAS). The document stated that high-profile Chinese officials see an “arms race” dynamics in AI as a threat to global piece. The exponential development in Artificial Intelligence will be among the main topic of Innovate & Plenary Session during Webit.Festival Europe - the largest digital economy and innovation event in that part of the world. Recently China announced that some of the smartest students in the country have been recruited from high school to begin training as the world’s youngest AI weapons scientists. The 27 boys and 4 girls, all aged 18 and under, were selected for the four-year experimental programme for intelligent weapons systems at the Beijing Institute of Technology from more than 5000 candidates. BIT is one of the country’s top weapons research institutes, and the launch of the new programme is evidence of the weight it places on the development of AI technology for military purposes. US Army is also looking into giving full control of some weapon systems to fully autonomous artificial intelligence robots, because time is of the essence if you want to defeat the enemy. Experts believe the such weapons may reduce the Army’s reaction time against an attach, therefore increasing its abilities in the battlefield. The Army Contracting Command has called on potential vendors in industry and academia to submit ideas to help build its Advanced Targeting and Lethality Automated System (ATLAS), which will use AI and machine learning to give ground-combat vehicles autonomous targeting capabilities. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the major steps that policy makers, scientists and corporate leaders need to take in order to ensure that humanity will use AI in a safe way for all of us. 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 Defence 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.

If there is one industry that will be disrupted the most from the technological advancements that we can see today - it is healthcare. Today, it is inefficient, bureaucratic and capital-intensive, but most importantly, it is not oriented towards the patient and its personal needs. With the development of technologies, such as Gene Editing, Artificial Intelliigence, Robotics, Blockchain and Big Data, we can be certain, that healthcare of the future will be completely different than the one we know today. Delivering affordable and quality healthcare to almost 10 billion people on the planet by 2050 will probably turn out to be a huge problem for all of us. It will requre from both politicians and corporate leaders to define the boundaries of basic and luxury care, while tеchnolgy is transforming everything from prevention to diagnosis and treatment. The exponential changes in healthcare will be among the main topics of Webit.Festival Europe 2019 and its Health Summit.The third edition of the event will be chaired by prof. Shafi Ahmed - the most watched surgeon in the human history and world’s renown innovator in VR and AR. Personalization in medicine will continue to be among the most important trends in healthcare. It will make the care for the patient tailored to its unique needs, genetic makeup and lifestyle, which will immediately lead to better results for each and everyone of us. This new approach could reduce greatly the number of ineffective interventions, save the whole system lots of unnecessary cots and give us better outcomes. A recent study showed that using a genetic test on breast cancer patients for example reduces chemotherapy use by 34%. While personalized medicines have existed for almost two decades, advances in science and technology will make our diagnostics smarter and more targeted. This will help phisicians identify patients who may be eligable for appropriate treatment options. The importance of personalized medicine has been captured very well by the former US president Barack Obama. During his last days in office, he stated that it will give us the greatest opportunities for new medical breakthroughs that we have ever seen. “Doctors have always recognized that every patient is unique, and doctors have always tried to tailor their treatments as best they can to individuals. You can match a blood transfusion to a blood type. That was an important discovery. What if matching a cancer cure to our genetic code was just as easy, just as standard? What if figuring out the right dose of medicine was as simple as taking our temperature”, he asked. With current treatments, patients are treated with a one-size-fits-all approach and if the therapy is not effective another therapy is attempted. Personalized medicine or precision medicine aims to change this paradigm by finding diagnostic markers (in terms of DNA, RNA, proteins or metabolites) that can predict therapy response. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the future healthcare and what steps need to me made in order to turn its use towards the single patient. During Health Summit you will get the chance to listen to top enterprise, science and policy leaders, such as the Former Director of Life Course and Ageing in WHO, Dr. John Beard, the Chair of Medicine in Singularity University, Daniel Kraft, the President of European Health Parliament, Joseph Elborn, the Cheif Medical Officer at IBM, Mark Davies, the CEO of Open Health Network, Tatyana Kanzaveli, the Managing Director for EMEA at IBM Watson Health, Mark O’Herlihy 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.

In the next several decades the increasing role of robots will most likely be the most dramatic change we will experience in our everyday life. Recent studies in developed countries show that the more than 50% of the people are certain that within the next 50 years, a robot will be part of every household. This shows that many societies, or at least the young people that will experience full scale of those changes already accepted them as part of their future. Today, robots are not perceived as a threat, but as an instrument that will change the way we communicate with machines and our attitude towards them. In the years to come we will need to ask ourselves both practical and ethical questions about the integration of robots. And many of them will be discussed during the Innovate & Plenary Sessionof Webit.Festival Europe - the largest event for innovations and entrepreneurship in this part of the world. Our perception of robots will form the values and culture in the Digital Age. The mass automation will change entirely the landscape of manufacturing and many service sectors and both create new jobs and erase some. While pessimists think that robots will completely jeopardize todays jobs and machine journalists, doctors and lawyers will replace human experts, optimists predict that the problems of human relationships will be overcome by replaceable robot partners. During Webit.Festival Europe the guests of the event will be able to meet with two of the most interesting conceptual robots that the world can offer today. The CTO of Realbotix, Guile Lindroth will present us the first companion robot with advanced AI - Harmony. At first you may think of her as a chat bot with a fancy body, but once you spend time with her, you start asking yourself if this is the prototype of the AI partner of the future. Last year Forbes listed robotic companions as the most unexpected disruptive tech. The creators of Harmony started their experiments years ago, while thay were developing silicon prosthetics for the movie industry. Today, they are ready to change the lives of thousands and create new opportunities for human-machine communication. While the role of Harmony may look too futuristic for many, machines like Furhat will probably be part of our everyday life really soon. The social robot that communicate with humans with self learning social skills will be presented by the CEO of Furhat Robotics, Samer Al Moubayed. In its official website, the company says that Furhat is ready to meet us in the real world. It can serve customers, provide companionship, train employees, or teach a language. The only limit is our own immagionation. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the future of robots and their role in the future of our career, social life and even personal communications. 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.

As the world is going on its path towards a Gibabit society, the secured transfers of data and money are becoming a priority for individuals, businesses and governments. Recent years have shown us the huge importance of cybersecurity on our personal and corporate information. But along with the opportunities that come with our technological advancements, the treats that they pose will only become larger. A recent study showed that 70% of corporate respondents in the US had experienced a security breach in the past two years. 85% of those indicated that they have become victims of two or more breaches. The topics of Cyber Security, Privacy, Hacking, Security Software, Mobile Security and Data Encryption, among others, will be discussed during the Cybersecurity Summit of this year’s Webit.Festival Europe - the largest event for innovations and entrepreneurship in this part of the world. Meanwhile, meeting domestic and external challenges of cybersecurity on corporate and government scale will be among the main topics during the Innovate! & Plenary Session of Webit. Even technological giants, such as Facebook, are unable to handle their security in the best way possible. Which leaves our personal data and conversations vulnerable to bad actors online. At the beginning of April a vast collection of data on Facebook users was again exposed to the public on the cloud computing servers of another tech giant - Amazon. Two third-party app developers were found to have stored user data in a way that allowed it to be downloaded by the public. One of them stored data containing more than 540 million records, including comments, likes, reactions and account names. Such breack comes after the huge scandal including the data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica and its role in American presidential elections and the referendum for Brexit. Cybersecurity problems like that created a demand for a huge corporate and political debate about our data online and finding ways to keep it safe. Since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, there has been a lot of discussion in Western policy circles on how to deal with the so called hybrid warfare tactics. According to specialists, hybrid warfare is a coordinated an synchronized action, that deliberately targets democratic states’ and institutions systematic vulnerabilities, through a wide rangeo f means. Such activities exploit the tresholds of detection and attribution, as well as the border between war and piece. While hybrid warfare can be prevented or deterred, it can’t be easily defeated. If the social, political and economic conditions allow hybrid tactics to be effective, than it is probably too late to stop them, without making systematic changes. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the major steps that world’s policy makers and corporate leaders will need to take to create the infrastructure of tomorrow and protect us from the threats that will come with it. During the 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. During the Cybersecurity Summit you can listen to the Chief Cybersecurity Officer of Siemens, Natalia Oropeza, the Chief Scientist of McAfee, Raj Samani, the Director and Co-Founder of JVP Cyber Labs, Nimrod Kozlovski, the President of CYBERPOL & ECIPS, Ricardo Baretzky, the CEO of Infinitum Humanitarian Systems, Eric Rasmussen and other renowned experts. 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.

If there is one thing that is slowing down or evolution as social species for the last centuries, it is the lack of inclusion and equal opportunities for every person on this planet, no matter of its race, gender or nationality. Inequality is something that the future generations will most certainly view as a major stain in our history. And it is also something that we need to eradicate, in order to use our full human potential and reach the limits of our capabilities. Just take the example of the first image of a Black Hole’s event horizon. This amazing accomplishment for humanity would not be possible without the efforts of Katie Bouman - a 29-yeas old postdoctoral fellow at Harvard, who helped develop the code to find the black hole in the haystack of data collected from Event Horizon Telescope. Imagine how many amazing discoveries we could have if we are able to grant equal opportunities for education and work for every woman on this planet. In fact, many experts believe, that the process of including women on the labor market will be the main driver of economic growth in the years to come. During the last decade, Webit Foundation has made its efforts to foster this process and not just talk about empowering women in business and politics, but doing so! For the upcoming Webit.Festival Europe, we gave 1000 tickets to women in technological industries. Of course, this became a catalyst for some backlash towards us. Our Executive Chairman Plamen Russev even received an email, in which he is called a sexist for not providing the same amount of tickets for the event to men in different industries. Regardless of such views, we are more than confident that or efforts for promoting the role of Women in Tech are a step in the right direction. That is the reason why for the second year in a row Webit.Festival is doing its best to improve the ratio of women to men speakers globally. According to the annual Global Gender Gap Report of WEF, it will take 108 years to achieve overall gender parity and 202 years to achieve full equality in the workplace. As we can’t just accept such dark predictions for our future, Webit became the platform for discussing the changing role of women in business in politics in a times of dramatic changes, caused by tech advancements in areas, such as AI, Blockchain, Automation and Robotics. Eurostat’s data analytics show that Bulgaria takes the second place in EU with 49% women managers. We think that this makes Sofia, the Digital Capital, a perfect place for such discussion that would shape the future corporate and government actions towards a future that treat every person as equal. Come to Webit.Festival Europe and learn about the major steps that world’s policy makers and corporate leaders will need to take to equal opportunities for everyone. 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.