Web Summit

Web Summit is an annual technology conference held in Lisbon, Portugal, considered the largest tech event in the world.[1][2] Founded in 2009, by Paddy Cosgrave, David Kelly and Daire Hickey, Web Summit was originally held in Dublin, Ireland, until 2016, when it moved permanently to Lisbon, Portugal.[3][4] Web Summit has been described as the most important tech event in the world.[5][6][7][8]

Web Summit
StatusActive
GenreTechnology
VenueAltice Arena and Lisbon Exhibition & Congress Centre
Location(s)Lisbon
Coordinates38°46′4.9″N 9°5′42.6″W
CountryPortugal
Inaugurated2009 (Dublin)
FoundersPaddy Cosgrave, David Kelly and Daire Hickey
Most recent4–7 November 2019
Attendance70,000 (2018)
Websitewebsummit.com
Praça do Comércio in Lisbon, Portugal.

The conference's topics center on internet technology, emerging technologies, and venture capitalism. Speakers have included a mix of CEOs, subject-matter experts, celebrities, and politicians, such as Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, Al Gore, and U.N Secretary-General António Guterres, among numerous others. Web Summit partners range from Fortune 500 companies to start-ups, with attendees representing all levels and sectors of the global high technology industry.

Web Summit runs events throughout the world including F.ounders,[9] RISE Conference in Hong Kong,[10] Collision in Toronto,[11] SURGE in Bangalore and MoneyConf in Dublin.

Personalities

Partners

Web Summit's partners, which include Fortune 500 companies, government entities, and private foundations, include: (as of 2019)[12]

2020

Web Summit 2020 took place from December 2 to December 4 as an online conference, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In December 2020, Web Summit announced the launch of a new conference in Japan, Web Summit Tokyo. The company also announced that the Asia-focused RISE Conference will be moving to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Both conferences are scheduled to be held as in-person events in 2022.[13][14]

2019

Web Summit 2019 took place in Portugal, from November 4 to November 7 at the Altice Arena & Fil in Lisbon, Portugal.[15] Some of the speakers included Edward Snowden; former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair; former professional boxer Wladimir Klitschko; Jaden Smith; Guo Ping (Rotating Chairman of Huawei) and Katherine Maher the CEO of Wikipedia.

Nutrix won Web Summit PITCH competition for the most ambitious early-stage startups. 900 startups participated.[16]

2018

Web Summit 2018 took place in Lisbon from November 4 to November 7. Attendance was at 70,000 participants. Some of the speakers include Medium Founder & CEO Ev Williams, President Microsoft Corporation Brad Smith, and CEO at Booking.com Gillian Tans.[17]

Marine Le Pen controversy

It was announced that Marine Le Pen of the National Rally would be one of the speakers, which caused controversy.[18][19][20][21] Paddy Consgrave initially argued that despite her 'wrongheaded' politics, he felt that her vews would be adequately challenged by professional journalists.[18][19][20][21] As a result of criticism, Paddy Cosgrave announced on Twitter that the invitation to her would be rescinded.[18][19][20][21]

2017
Arm Holdings CEO Simon Segars; Web Summit 2017

Web Summit 2017 took place in the Altice Arena in Lisbon from November 6–9. The event promised to bring 60,000 attendees from over 160 countries together.[22]

1,000 speakers were initially confirmed for the conference and, finally, over 1200 spoke.[23] From the political sphere, speakers such as Former Vice President of the United States of America Al Gore, European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager, and former president of France François Hollande were announced early. In addition to these speakers, big names in tech attending were Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, Oracle CEO Mark Hurd, Microsoft president Brad Smith, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman, Arm Holdings CEO Simon Segars, Slack co-founder and CEO Stewart Butterfield, Asana co-founder and CEO and Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz, Alexander Nix of Cambridge Analytica and Booking.com president and CEO Gillian Tans.

Speakers include former world heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko, actress and activist Sophia Bush, former Portuguese professional football player and Ballon D'Or winner Luis Figo, Vogue international editor Suzy Menkes, former chess world champion Garry Kasparov, musician Wyclef Jean, and Game of Thrones actor Liam Cunningham.[24]

A dinner that was held in the National Pantheon was criticised by Portugese Prime Minister António Costa who said it was "unworthy of the respect due" to the National Monument.[25] He said that although it was legal, it was because the previous government had allowed what he called "offensive use of this monumen".[25] Paddy Consgrage tweeted his apologies.[25]

2016
Paddy Cosgrave, Web Summit founder (left) and António Costa, Prime Minister of Portugal (right); 2016

In September 2015 Web Summit co-founder and CEO Paddy Cosgrave announced that the event would be held in Lisbon for three consecutive editions, from 2016 to 2018.[26] Cosgrave cited the local startup scene and a "cosmopolitan city with better infrastructure conditions and a larger number of hotel rooms" for the decision.[27]

The three-day event held from November 7–10 at the Altice Arena, site of Expo '98, drew 53,056 attendees from more than 150 countries and more than 1,500 start-ups spread over 21 venues.[28]

Among the more than 600 speakers were a number of tech top executives from around the world, including John Chambers of Cisco, Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer, and Amazon CTO Werner Vogels. Also speaking at the event were prominent figures from non-tech areas, such as actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Salil Shetty of Amnesty International and Mogens Lykketoft, president of the general assembly at the United Nations, as well as footballer Luís Figo and both the Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa and Prime Minister António Costa.[27][28][29] The percentage of women among speakers at the Web Summit was 47% according to independent estimates.[30]

Some of those who had paid up to €5,000 for tickets into the event were unable to get into the event and had to watch it on a screen ouside.[31]

2015
Web Summit 2015

Web Summit 2015 was held over three days from 3 November until the 5 November at the RDS in Dublin. Over 42,000 people attended the event over the three days. Speakers included Ed Catmull of Pixar, Michael Dell, Bill Ford and Chris Froome.

In September 2015 Web Summit announced that they would be moving the event from Dublin to Lisbon. Following the announcement organisers released email correspondence between the Irish Government and Web Summit CEO Paddy Cosgrave about hotel costs, traffic and other issues around infrastructure in Dublin. This led to a debate in the Irish media about the support the Government had provided to the event since it began and what future promises they could make.[32]

Problems arose with the Wi-Fi,[33] but on a lesser scale than in 2014.

2014
Paddy Cosgrave and Taoiseach Enda Kenny; 2014

Web Summit 2014 was held over three days and consisted of nine stages or Summits as they are known; Centre, Machine, Enterprise, Marketing, Builders, Society, Sport, Film and Music. Eva Longoria, Peter Thiel and Bono were among the speakers that spoke over the three-day event, with attendance of 22,000 people from 109 countries.[34][35]

On Day 1 there were problems with the WiFi network and Web Summit founder Paddy Cosgrave took to the stage on two occasions to apologise for the connectivity problems. The RDS defended their technical set-up with CEO Michael Duffy saying, "The WiFi has successfully responded to the exceptional demands placed on it. This is an unprecedented WiFi density compared to similar European tech events." Attendees were mostly disparaging in their remarks, with some deriding it on social media as "the most Irish thing ever".[36]

International broadcasters including CNBC, CNN, Fox Business News, Bloomberg, Sky News. Al Jazeera and the BBC all covered the event.

After the announcement of the decision to move the 2016 Web Summit to Lisbon, several Irish technology correspondents cited the WiFi debacle as one major push factor behind the move.[37][38]

2013
Web Summit 2013

In 2013, over 10,000 people attended the Web Summit, the vast majority from outside Ireland.[39] Speakers included Elon Musk, Shane Smith, Tony Hawk, Drew Houston, and Niklas Zennström.

The event expanded in its scope with a number of side-events launching as part it, including the Night Summit,[40] a series of after-hours events featuring musicians from throughout the world, and the Food Summit, a two-day showcase of gourmet Irish Food.[41]

Irish Prime Minister, Enda Kenny, also opened the NASDAQ Market from the Web Summit, the first time it was opened outside of New York since the Facebook IPO.[42] The event was covered substantially in the international media with Bloomberg Television, CNN, the Wall Street Journal and Wired covering the event.[39]

2012
Web Summit 2012

In 2012, 4,200 people attended Web Summit, approximately 40% of these came from companies based in Ireland (which provides a European HQ for several major tech companies) and 60% came from companies based elsewhere in Europe. Speakers included Tim Armstrong, Wael Ghonim, and Arkady Volozh.

A number of companies from across the world also launched their new products or made announcements as part of the event.[43]

2009-2011
Dublin Web Summit 2011

The first Web Summit was a mix of bloggers, journalists and technologists in a hotel on the outskirts of Dublin.[44] Panelists and speakers included Iain Dale, the political blogger, Ben Hammersley of the Guardian and Ian Douglas of the Daily Telegraph. In 2010 it was a meet-up for 400 or so of the local technology community in the Chartered Accountants House in Dublin. Speakers were mainly local entrepreneurs, business people, and investors.[45] In 2011, the event tripled in size and moved to the Royal Dublin Society. Speakers included Chad Hurley, Jack Dorsey and Matt Mullenweg.

See also

References
  1. Portuguese American Journal - Web Summit: Lisbon hosting the largest tech event in the world
  2. Forbes - Seven Enterprise Startup Standouts At Massive WebSummit Conference
  3. Temperton, James (9 September 2015). "Web Summit 2016 will ditch Dublin for Lisbon". Wired UK. Retrieved 29 September 2015.
  4. Reuters - Web Summit to stay in Lisbon for 10 years
  5. Forrester - Web Summit Stakes Its Claim As One Of The Most Important Global Tech Events
  6. Layer - Web Summit Uses Layer to Create a Frictionless Experience at the Fastest-Growing Tech Conference in History
  7. Web Summit - What is Web Summit?
  8. DW - Lisbon hosts Web Summit: the Davos of the tech world
  9. "Dublin Hosts World's Technology Elite". Wall Street Journal. 28 October 2011. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  10. "TOOD at RISE Conference 2016, Hong Kong". TOOD. 8 June 2016. Retrieved 8 June 2016.
  11. "Collision 2019". Collision. Retrieved 20 May 2019.
  12. Web Summit - Partners
  13. "Web Summit will hold RISE 2022 in Kuala Lumpur, launch a new event in Tokyo". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2020-12-03.
  14. "Web Summit will hold RISE 2022 in Kuala Lumpur and launch new conference in Tokyo". BEAMSTART - Uplifting Lives Through Entrepreneurship. Retrieved 2020-12-03.
  15. "Web Summit | Lisbon 2019 | Where the tech world meets". Web Summit | Lisbon. Retrieved 2019-04-23.
  16. Callejas, Eder (7 November 2019). "Nutrix Named Winner of Web Summit's 2019 PITCH Competition". TechPope. Retrieved 19 December 2019.
  17. "Speakers at Web Summit | Lisbon, November 4–7, 2019". Web Summit | Lisbon. Retrieved 2019-04-23.
  18. McDermott, Stephen (15 August 2018). "Web Summit founder withdraws invite for far-right leader Marine Le Pen to 2018 event". TheJournal.ie. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  19. McSorley, Christina (16 August 2018). "Marine Le Pen's presence deemed 'disrespectful' at Web Summit". BBC News. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  20. O'Donovan, Donal (16 August 2018). "Web Summit chief in U-turn as invitation to far-right leader Le Pen is withdrawn". Irish Independent. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  21. Murphy, Greg (15 August 2018). "Latest: Web Summit withdraw Le Pen invitation saying it is 'disrespectful' to Portugal and attendees". Irish Examiner. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  22. "WEB SUMMIT | LISBON 2017 | WHERE THE TECH WORLD MEETS". WEB SUMMIT | LISBON 2017. Retrieved 2017-08-24.
  23. "Web Summit Blog 2017".
  24. "Speakers - The biggest names in tech | Web Summit". WEB SUMMIT | LISBON 2017. Retrieved 2017-08-24.
  25. Halpin, Hayley (14 November 2017). "Web Summit organiser apologises over 'offensive' dinner at Portugal's National Pantheon". TheJournal.ie. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  26. "Web Summit ditches Dublin for Lisbon". 23 September 2015. Retrieved 10 November 2016.
  27. "PLEASE WELCOME THE WEB SUMMIT 2016 IN LISBON". Global Corporations Society. 26 September 2016. Retrieved 11 November 2016.
  28. "Meet 53,056 attendees with tickets". WebSummit. 20 June 2016. Retrieved 11 November 2016.
  29. "O Web Summit já acabou. No próximo ano há mais". 10 November 2016.
  30. "Gender in Research and Innovation". 10 November 2016. Retrieved 10 November 2016.
  31. Russell, Cliodhna (7 November 2016). "People who paid thousands for tickets left waiting outside Web Summit". TheJournal.ie. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  32. "Criticism over Government handling of Web Summit grows". The Irish Times. Retrieved 19 March 2017.
  33. "Old problems surface one last time at Web Summit". The Irish Times. Retrieved 19 March 2017.
  34. "Live Blog: Web Summit 2014". Irish Independent. 4 November 2014. Retrieved 4 November 2014.
  35. "Web Summit guests to spend €100m in city". Herald. 4 November 2014. Retrieved 4 November 2014.
  36. "'The most Irish thing ever': WiFi trouble at Dublin's Web Summit". TheJournal.ie. 4 November 2014. Retrieved 30 September 2015.
  37. "Web Summit to move to Lisbon in 2016, cites infrastructure reasons". Silicon Republic. 23 Sep 2015. Retrieved 30 September 2015.
  38. "Harsh reality for Irish technology scene". Irish Examiner. 28 September 2015. Retrieved 30 September 2015.
  39. "Dublin Becomes Center of European Tech World". BloombergTV. 31 October 2013. Retrieved 31 October 2013.
  40. "Dublin The story behind The Night Summit". Web Summit. 22 October 2013. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  41. "Food Summit a unique opportunity to promote Irish food". Web Summit. 30 October 2013. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  42. "Trading on NASDAQ opened in Ireland for the first time". Web Summit. 31 October 2013. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  43. "Web Summit Picks SmartThings Out Of 100-Strong Startup Competition". TechCrunch. 20 October 2012. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  44. "Revolution in media and politics to dominate Dublin Web Summit". 21 October 2009. Retrieved 5 October 2016.
  45. "Payments at the Web Summit". Realex Payments. 20 October 2010. Retrieved 26 November 2013.

Bibliography
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