Sesame Summit 2026 – application open

The heart of Nordic innovation

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Photo by Gorm K Gaare

What’s the story behind Oslo Innovation Week (OIW)?

Since 2005, Oslo Innovation Week has been gathering startups, corporates, investors, innovation drivers, tech experts and creatives in the city centre of Oslo. Our first ever digital Oslo Innovation Week last year attracted 25,000 attendees from over 50 countries.  Oslo Innovation Week invites you to the heart of Nordic innovation  – the home of Kahoot, No Isolation and Otovo. An arena for facilitating actions and thought provoking ideas for bold and new innovation. Connect and experience with pioneering entrepreneurs, founders, investors and business leaders. Join us in bringing together a smart compact Nordic capital with high quality of life and easy access to nature alongside world leading startups, technology innovation, climate friendly solutions and entrepreneurship  – to the global stage.

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Photo by Gorm K Gaare

What role is OIW playing in furthering the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals?

Every single event must meet at least one of the 17 goals. The UN SDGs are key to everything we work with and believe in. This year we will have various climate tech specific events including a Nordic Climate Tech Demo Day which will feature the best nine Nordic Climate Tech growth companies presenting to a panel of investors from EQT, Pale Blue Dot, Voima Ventures and Ecosia. The one common goal for everybody on stage is that their sustainable solutions and investments will help reduce carbon emissions.

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Photo by Gorm K Gaare

Which of this year’s 80+ events are you most looking forward to?

Well aside from the Climate Tech Demo Day I mentioned above, I am also really looking forward to the diverse range of events happening around Oslo including one of the worlds fastest growing solar panel companies Otovo hosting an event about scaling your product and product organization during fast growth. We also have a great event called Scaleup Workshop where the best scaleup founders and investors meet to discuss the big growth subjects such as international expansion and company organization amongst other things. We are also really excited about all of the hybrid events where we will be able to gather the most important Nordic founders and investors as well as allowing an international audience via our digital program.

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Photo by Gorm K Gaare

What’s the most exciting thing about OIW for founders?

I think it is has to be the chance to network and meet the right people to help their companies grow. We have countless amazing panel discussions, workshops, conferences and networking events gathering innovators and business drivers – we put extra emphasis on creating smaller arenas where founders can take home some tangible learnings as well as building networks and who knows, meet their next investment or their newest CTO or co-founder. There is a real buzz this year to meet again after 18 months of almost no physical events in Norway.

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Photo by Gorm K Gaare

How are you planning to facilitate networking opportunities between attendees?

Since most will be hybrid, many events will focus on creating excellent digital content that in addition have smaller, exclusive physical audiences. The pandemic hasn’t ended so digital content is vital for our international attendees with many panels for example including both physical and digital speakers – we make it all work! There will also be various physical networking events that take place before or after digital events and of course the odd digital only events where networking will moderated via various digital event platforms.


Interested in finding out more about this incredible annual event in Oslo? Check out our Sesamers profile of Oslo Innovation Week 2021

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Events 2 days ago

Last week, I spent three days at Bits and Pretzels in Munich — a startup-focused event with a distinctly Bavarian flavor. Think Oktoberfest meets startup conference, complete with dirndls, lederhosen, and more beer than you might expect. As someone building an AI-powered event platform, I went in with a specific mission: Observe how startups actually market themselves at events. Here’s what I discovered: GoodBytz: The power of good demos What they did: Robotics startup GoodBytz set up a booth where its robots prepared kaiserschmarrn (a traditional German dessert) all day long. Why it worked: Nothing beats seeing a product in action. While other booths had brochures and demos, GoodBytz’s robots were actually cooking. The smell, the movement and the end result stirred together an experience that people will remember and talk about. The lesson: If you have a physical product, show it in action. The old writing adage generalizes well: Show, don’t tell.  Let people see, hear and touch the product. WeRoad: The bathroom hack What they did: Posted “Missing Investor” flyers in bathroom stalls with QR codes pointing to their website. Why it worked: Pure genius. Every startup at the event was looking for investors, but the “Missing Investor” headline, while a bit on the nose, proved irresistible. Plus, bathroom stalls are one of the few places where people have 30 seconds to actually read something. The lesson: Think about where your target audience’s attention will remain undivided. Sometimes, the most effective marketing leverages the most unexpected places. Emqopter: Visual impact matters What they did: Designed a bright orange booth that displayed their drone prominently. Why it worked: In a sea of grey, white, beige and brown, Emqopter’s bright orange booth was impossible to overlook. The drone was real, too, and proved a real conversation starter. The lesson: Your booth is competing with hundreds of others. Make it visually distinctive and ensure your product is the hero. Quests: Community building using the product What they did: Created a busy, branded booth with accessories (toy car, traffic cones, a bulletin board) and used their anti-loneliness app to build communities among founders at the event. Why it worked: Quests used their product to solve a real problem right at the event, and the busy booth design generated energy and curiosity. The lesson: Use your product to solve a problem at the event — if it’s possible, of course. Demonstrate your value in real time. Dyno: Event-themed marketing What they did: Distributed branded electrolyte packs with the tagline “Your hangover ends. Your pension lasts – with Dyno.” Why it worked: Dyno aligned its messaging perfectly with the Oktoberfest theme. Every attendee was thinking about beer and hangovers, so Dyno’s goodies were quite relevant. The tagline was clever, memorable, and directly addressed a pain point most people at the event might have to deal with later. The lesson: Tailor your marketing to the event’s theme and culture. The more you tie your messaging and product to the context, the more memorable you become. So, what did I learn? Event marketing is about more than just showing up and setting up a booth; you have to understand your audience and create experiences that people will remember. Here’s what really struck me: most startups and even big companies don’t know how to leverage events properly. They book the booth, show up and hope for the best; maybe they bring some branded pens and a pop-up banner. Then they’ll go back home and wonder why they spent €5,000 in exchange for 50 business cards that never convert. The startups that stood out at Bits and Pretzels understand something fundamental: event ROI isn’t about booth size or location; it’s about strategy, creativity and planning. None of the startups above improvised on-site, or planned something the night before the event in their hotel rooms. They laid everything out 4-6 weeks before the event. A solid pre-event strategy is what separates successful event marketing from expensive booth rental.  But what matters most for early-stage startups is that you don’t need a massive budget to stand out. WeRoad’s bathroom stall hack probably cost €50 to print the flyers. A standard booth package at Bits and Pretzels would go for €3,000 to €5,500. The ROI difference is staggering when you compare the cost per meaningful conversation. That’s the difference between simply spending money and investing smartly. Building Sesamers has taught me that helping startups find the right events is only half the equation. The other half is helping them understand how to maximize ROI once they’re there. Good props aren’t a marketing expense; they’re opportunities to meet customers, investors and partners, and strike up engaging conversations.

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