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Top 60 Venture Capital Conferences & Events in 2021 – Selected


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Top Venture Capital conferences in 2023
Freshly updated with the best upcoming Venture Capital conferences in 2023.
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Based on the overwhelming response to our Top 75 Startup Events & Conferences in 2021, we received quite a few messages from our Venture Capital friends asking for a VC-specific rundown.

Top VC events in January

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CES 2021

January 11-14, Virtual Event

#exhibition #technology #consumer #healthcare #mobility #creative #entertainment #blockchain

CES is the world’s gathering place for all who thrive on the business of consumer technologies. It has served as the proving ground for innovators and breakthrough technologies for 50+ years – the global stage where next-generation innovations are introduced to the marketplace.

The all-digital CES 2021 will continue to be a platform to launch products, engage with global brands and define the future of the tech industry.

Biotech Showcase Digital 2021

January 11-15, Virtual Event

#conference #healthcare #healthtech #biotech #pharmaceutical #innovation

Biotech showcase is an investor and networking conference devoted to providing privasmall- and mid-cap biotechnology companies an opportunity to present to and meet with investors and biopharmaceutical executives during the course of one of the largest annual healthcare conferences that attracts investors and biopharmaceutical executives from around the world.

Future Investment Initiative 2021

January 26-28, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia​​

#conference #investment #innovation #humanity #impact

​​​The Future Investment Initiative (FII) is an international platform for expert-led debate between global leaders, investors and innovators with the power to shape the future of global investment. It is focused on utilizing investment to drive growth opportunities, enable innovation and disruptive technologies, and address global challenges.​

The third edi​​​​​​​​tion of FII will continue building active, global networks of influential decision makers to explore the emerging industries that will shape the global economy and investment landscape over the coming decades.​​

AVCJ Southeast Asia Private Markets Outlook 2021

January 28, Virtual Event

#conference #asia #market #industry #outlook

The event is organized by AVCJ and will bring together regional private markets leaders to discuss the key questions front of mind for industry. Hear how firms successfully dealt with the challenges and what opportunities they anticipate in the future.

AVCJ, an Acuris company, is the leading provider of Asian private equity and venture capital information and intelligence.

Top VC events in February

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LSX World Congress 2021

February 1-5, Virtual Event

#exhibition #healthtech #biotech #medtech #startup #showcase

LSX World Congress gathers the founders and CEOs of innovative start-ups through to publicly listed life sciences giants, and everyone in between.

It represents the breadth and depth of the cutting-edge research and technology driving the advances in the industry right now and in the near future.

SuperTechnology North America 2021

February 2-3, Virtual Event

#conference #technology #equity #america

SuperTechnology North America’s inaugural event brings together senior executives from buyout, growth equity and venture capital firms, along with institutional investors to interact and explore the latest trends, best practices and market challenges in technology investments in North America.

Startup Grind Global Conference 2021

February 22-25, Virtual Event

#conference #startup #technology #innovation #ecosystem

Presented by Startup Grind, the 2021 Global Conference will bring together startups from around the world. The new virtual and choose-what-you-pay model makes this year’s event more accessible for startups globally than ever before.

Join 15,000 others for conversation and collaboration around tech, startups, and the future of innovation.

Top VC events in March

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SAVCA 2021 Private Equity Conference

March 3-4, Sun City, South Africa (Hybrid)

#conference #africa #ecosystem #privateequity #VC

This event is organized by the Southern African Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (SAVCA).

SAVCA has presented an annual private equity industry conference since 2008. The conference is a highlight of the industry calendar and a key deliverable by SAVCA to the private equity ecosystem in Southern Africa.

You will meet representatives from private equity and venture capital fund managers active in South Africa, Southern Africa and other parts of Africa.

Paris Space Week

March 9-10, Virtual Event

#conference #spacetech #aerospace #mobility

Paris Space Week gathers the World’s Space Tech Ecosystem under one roof for 2 Days. The event brings together the brightest space agencies, large groups, SMEs, and start-ups and investors. And naturally, the international press and thousands of enthusiastic space executives.

The OurCrowd Global Investor Summit 2021

March 9, Jerusalem, Israel

#conference #technologies #startup #innovation #corporate

The Summit provides unprecedented insight into the world of startup venture capital, with exclusive exposure to cutting-edge technologies, the entrepreneurs behind them, and the corporate leaders deploying them.

Wolves Summit 2021

March 24-26, Warsaw, Poland (Hybrid)

#conference #cee #startup #VC #angel #investor

The event connects angel investors, VC funds, tech talent, and corporations with the most promising startups in the CEE region to help ambitious founders scale and foster international economic growth.

Emergence 2021

March 24-26, Virtual Event

#conference #VC #government #investment

Emergence 24 Hours Conference is the congregation of venture and angel investors, investment groups, government bodies, and large corporate entities from around the world for one whole day of discovery of over 100 investment opportunities.​

Step Anywhere 2021

March 29-31, Virtual Event

#conference #technology #emerging #markets #startups

Step Anywhere brings together a global audience of startups, investors, digital enthusiasts, brands, and more over 3 days online. Step Anywhere’s first edition in 2020 featured 6 tracks of live talks and panels, workshops, various startup programming, exhibition and showcasing opportunities, and live entertainment.

Top VC events in April

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MedCity Invest 2021

April 19-23, Virtual Event

#conference #healthcare #biotech #medtech #startups

MedCity INVEST unites active investors with corporate business development executives to facilitate investment opportunities with the most promising healthcare startups.

For more than a decade, biopharma, diagnostics, health IT, medical devices and beyond have presented here to investors.

Bio€quity Europe 2021

April 13-14, Dublin, Ireland

#conference #biotech #pharma #technology

Bio€quity Europe is the industry’s international showcase for financial dealmakers and pharmaceutical executives to assess and network with rising biotechs.

For the 21st anniversary meeting, more than 80 hand-picked companies will present their stories and participate in the thought-leading program. The agenda will allow for maximum financial networking through both ample breaks, receptions, and 1×1 meetings using EBD Group’s partneringONE® conference networking solution.

Collision 2021

April 20-22, Toronto, Canada

#conference #technology #academic #entertainment

The Collision Conference is  Canada’s biggest technology conference to date. Run by Web Summit, a company from Ireland that holds events across the globe, Collision hosts huge names in the business, academic, and entertainment spaces to talk about the role of technology in today’s world.

“Collision is one of the world’s biggest tech conferences.” – Bloomberg

“Collision buzzes with startup electricity.” – HuffPost

EU-Startup Summit 2021

April 29-30, Barcelona, Spain

#exhibition #startup #innovation #technology #showcase

The Summit showcases a selection of Europe’s hottest startups and come together to learn from some of the most successful European entrepreneurs of our time.

The two-day event is a great opportunity for networking, and a meeting point for aspiring entrepreneurs and investors who are aiming to build international tech companies.

Top VC events in May

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2021 ACA Summit

May 4-6, Oregon, Portland

#summit #VC #angel #investor #entrepreneurship #inovation

The annual Angel Capital Association Summit is the world’s premier professional development event for angel investors. ACA members, other accredited investors and professionals in the startup ecosystem are invited to attend this industry leading event, which includes essential new information and top networking opportunities for the people attending.

Capital Camp

May 25-27, Columbia, Missouri

#festival #VC #startups #networking

Capital Camp offers a unique event experience with serious investing conversations in shorts and sandals, interactive programming and a variety of outdoor activities.

This event is for curious, kind and thoughtful investors, capital providers, entrepreneurs, and executives pushing the frontiers and breaking new ground.

Startup DAYS

March 26-27, Bern, Switzerland

#conference #DeepTech #innovation

Discover the best Deep Technology available from the most promising startups from Switzerland and abroad.

New things are created when people come together and get involved with drive. This is what the startup days promote and thus make an active contribution to the evolvement of the Swiss startup ecosystem as well as to the innovative and competitiveness of Switzerland.

Startup Village 2021

May 27-28, Moscow, Russia

#conference #startup

Startup Village is the most large-scale startup conference in Russia and the CIS countries for technology entrepreneurs, organised by the Skolkovo Foundation in collaboration with the Foundation’s partners.

Top VC events in June

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Invest Canada ’21

June 8-9, Canada

Every year, the Canadian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (CVCA) brings together the Canadian and international private capital community to its signature event, the Invest Canada conference. Invest Canada is Canada’s venture capital and private equity conference. Each year, Invest Canada brings together the brightest minds and biggest names in the industry to make connections,

VivaTechnology 2021

June 17-19, Paris, France (Hybrid)

#exhibition #technology #startups #innovation #showcase #impact #change

VivaTechnology brings together people, from startups, corporates and VCs, to ignite growth, business transformation and positive change.

The 3-day annual conference has become, in only 4 years, one of the biggest gateway in Europe for innovation actors worldwide.

EBAN Congress 2021

June 14-16, Cork, Ireland

#conference #entrepreneurship #private #investment

The EBAN Annual Congress is widely recognised as one of Europe’s largest international private investment & entrepreneurship events.

The event will take place over a three-days, including Investor Led Workshops, Keynotes, pitching sessions, round table workshops etc.

Latitude59 2021

June 17-18, Estonia

#conference #startup #technology

Latitude59 is the flagship startup and tech event of the world’s first digital society. Latitude59 is THE place to be for various networking opportunities, in-depth discussions with top international players, several pitching rounds for both startups as well as investors, and an overall chance to get together and reflect on the crazy strenuous months behind us and forge new plans for the future.

4YFN 2021

June 28 – July 1, Barcelona, Spain

#exhibition #conference #startup #innovation

4YFN is the startup event of the world’s largest exhibition for the mobile industry, GSMA MWC. The goal of the event is to support startups, investors and companies to connect and launch new business ventures together.

At the core of 4YFN 2021 will be keynotes by influencers and pioneers, discussions among top experts of the industry, exhibition area – as well as insightful startup pitches.

Top VC events in July

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Sustainable Business Summit Global

July 13-14, Virtual Event

#summit #sustainability #business #finance

The Bloomberg Sustainable Business Summits bring together business leaders and investors globally to drive innovation and scale best practices in sustainable business and finance.

This global event will span key markets and time zones, leveraging Bloomberg’s unrivaled markets expertise to convene conversations uniquely focused on the risks and opportunities for corporate executives and forward-thinking investors in a 21st-century economy.

GCV Digital Forum 2021

July 21-25, Virtual Event

#conference #global #innovation

Industry leaders will use the GCV Digital Forum 4.0 to share their thought-leadership, portfolio companies and startups will debate with investors, and all delegates will be able to network via the intuitive online platform, which will also feature the GCV Connect platform powered by Proseeder and the GCV Analytics tools. All of the content will remain available for delegates to access for a period after the event has taken place.

Top VC events in August

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sTARTUp Day 2021

August 25-27, Tartu, Estonia (Hybrid)

#festival #technology #innovation #networking #collaboration #matchmaking

sTARTUp Day is bringing together startup-minded people to celebrate entrepreneurship, to discuss business, innovation and new technologies, share startup success stories and lessons learned.

The two-day program is complemented with several pitching competitions, hands-on seminars with professionals and a large expo area where companies showcase their latest innovations.

In addition you can expect organized matchmaking to connect startups with investors, find future business partners and startup-corporate collaboration.

SHIFT Business Festival 2021

August 25-26, Turku, Finland (Hybrid)

#festival #intelligent #business #innovation #technology

SHIFT unites innovators and decision makers to develop intelligent businesses that will save the world.

Their aim is to make every business intelligent. That means being more sustainable while making a good profit, using the powers new technologies offer. SHIFT offers you the inspiration, network and tools to actualize the change.

Top VC events in September

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Hong Kong 2021 Venture Capital World Summit

September 1, Hong Kong (TBC)

#summit #asia #network

Hong Kong Venture Capital World Summit, World Series Season of Investment Conferences is here to help businesses get more capital and expertise as they need to scale up, and grow internationally with the support if required from our trusted network of investors

IPEM 2021

September 8-9, Paris, France

#conference #privateequity #business #network #ecosystem

IPEM has become the benchmark of Private Capital events. Its unique and surprising “PE meets tradeshow” format has won its fame for being a dynamic, easy and effective business congress.

IPEM has grown to an international event of 3,200 participants, while keeping the heart and soul of an intimate and relaxed gathering of all private markets.

FinovateFall

September 13-15, New York, United States (Hybrid)

#conference #finance #technology #innovation

The world needs fintech now more than ever. Whether you’re a fintech or financial institution, it’s time to step up. See cutting-edge fintech demos, hear expert advice, and connect with people who can help you take it to the next level.

Finovate is known for spotlighting new fintech innovations from seed-stage startups to established leaders.

TechBBQ 2021

September 16-17, Copenhagen, Denmark (Hybrid)

#conference #startups #innovation #technology #showcase

TechBBQ brings together talent, capital, and knowledge to reach their common goals: support the Nordic startup ecosystem, celebrate successes, and learn from failures.

This year’s edition will be held in a new online format.

SuperInvestor 2021

September 20-23, London, UK

#conference #market #insights #europe

SuperInvestor is a conference dedicated to Private Equity, Fundraising and Venture Capital with a focus on general partners (GPs) / limited partners (LPs) relations.

The 3-day event offers valuable interactions and market-leading insights.

TechCrunch Disrupt 2021

September 21-23, Virtual Event

#conference #entrepreneurship #investment #innovation #technology

TechCrunch Disrupt is three days of non-stop online programming with two big focuses: founders and investors shaping the future of disruptive technology and ideas and startup experts providing insights to entrepreneurs.

The event is the ultimate Silicon Valley experience where the leaders of the startup world gather to ask questions, make connections and be inspired.

Oslo Innovation Week 2021

September 27-30, Virtual Event

#conference #sustainability #innovation #technology

Oslo Innovation Week invites you to the heart of Nordic innovation – 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.

SaaStr Annual 2021

September 27-29, San Mateo, United States (Hybrid)

#conference #SaaS #cloud #deeptech

Join 10,000+ Cloud and SaaS Founders, VC and Execs. In-person, in the SF Bay Area, in the San Mateo County Fairgrounds. The 7th SaaStr Annual will offer 3 full days, 100’s of workshops, and 1000s of Mentoring sessions.

Asia PE-VC Summit 2021

September 28 – October 1, Virtual Event

#conference #asia #market #startup #investment

Organized by DealStreetAsia (a Nikkei Group company), the Asia PE-VC promises deep dive into the current landscape and a functional roadmap for the year ahead, with LP/GP perspectives on Southeast Asia, India and Greater China; the challenge and opportunities for PE & VC firms, frontier market plays and strategies, and deep dives into the potential of the spotlight countries in region, like India, Indonesia and Vietnam.

TNW Conference 2021

September 30 – October 1, Amsterdam, Netherlands (Hybrid)

#conference #DeepTech #AI #sustainability #cybersecurity #retail #consumer

TNW Conference is a technology festival that brings together international technology executives, top-tier investors, and promising startups for two days of business and knowledge sharing – surrounded by some of the highest production values at any tech event on the planet.

Top VC events in October

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South Summit 2021

October 5-7, Madrid, Spain (Hybrid)

#conference #technology #innovation #health #work

SOUTH SUMMIT is one one the leading startup conference in southern Europe, with a growing number of attendees coming from Latin America as well.

A platform created with the aim to bring together startups, international investors and leading corporations in the search for innovation.

DLD Tel Aviv Live Innovation Festival 2021

October 11-14, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem

#conference #startup #business #innovation #technology

DLD Tel Aviv Innovation Festival is an event dedicated to business opportunities for investments in startups, technology and innovations. It includes conferences on various technologies and a festival part which celebrates Israeli innovation and its contribution to the global ecosystem.

Venture Capital Forum 2021

October 12-13, Paris France

#conference #ecosystem #europe

The Venture Capital Forum 2021 is organized by Invest Europe – one of the world’s largest association of private capital providers.

Each year the event brings together the best and brightest minds of the private equity sector to learn from one another, exchange and test ideas, and network with their peers.

SaaStock EMEA 2021

October 12-14, Virtual Event

#conference #deeptech #software #technology

SaaStock EMEA brings together the best B2B SaaS founders, executives, and investors across EMEA for intensive knowledge and networking. This years online edition is dedicated to intensive knowledge and networking, all in the name of traction, growth, and scale.

Tech in Asia 2021

October 12-14, Virtual Event

#conference #technology #people #finance #marketing #sales #product

Tech in Asia is a media, events, and jobs platform on a mission to build and serve Asia’s tech and startup community.

The annual tech and startup conference connects top minds, catalyzes opportunities and creates a high-value business community. It is specially created to catalyze business opportunities between Asia’s top startups, CEOs, VCs, and conglomerates in public and private markets.

Infoshare 2021

October 14-15, Gdańsk, Poland (Hybrid)

#conference #CEE #technology #innovation #startup

Infoshare is the conference where you can share your story and make your ideas happen. It’s one of the biggest tech conferences in CEE (Central & Eastern Europe). Continously Infoshare is creating an ecosystem that combines new technologies with business.

GITEX Technology Week 2021

October 17-21, Dubai, UAE

#exhibition #technology #innovation #startup #business

At GITEX the world’s technology leaders, up enterprises and startups come together to show you the future of every business and every industry, as it happens.

CC Forum London 2021

October 27-29, London, UK

#conference #sustainability #philanthropy

CC Forum will feature institutional and private wealth aimed at impact investment, philanthropy and sustainable development. Be part of one of the world’

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Founder in Biarritz
Events 3 weeks ago

The event calendar goes quiet in July and August. Deadlines don’t. This article assumes you’re an early stage founder, pre-seed or seed at most, without a marketing team. You are the events team. The next eight weeks are the only window of the year where you can work on your startup event strategy instead of running it. Here’s how to use them, roughly in order of urgency. 1. Search for calls for speakers Most Q1 and Q2 2027 conferences select their speakers in autumn, which means applications open now. SXSW PanelPicker is the obvious one and since it closes on July 26th they always lack submissions from Europe. But every major event runs some version of it, usually buried three clicks deep on their website. Before you apply anywhere, build a speaker one-pager: your topic, three talking points, a short bio, one decent photo, and links to any previous talk. Program teams review hundreds of proposals. Make theirs easy. 2. Apply to startup competitions Autumn competitions open their calls in summer: One warning from someone who reads hundreds of these applications every year: judges can tell when ChatGPT wrote your answers. Roughly 80% of the applications I review show obvious AI usage, and the low-effort ones go straight to the no pile. Use AI to structure your thinking if you want. Write the answers yourself. Sophie wrote a full breakdown of how startup competitions work from the organizer’s side. Read it before you apply. Knowing what organizers optimize for changes how you write. 3. Apply to your country’s delegation for major events CES, MWC, Web Summit: most countries send an official startup delegation, and the selection happens months ahead. For CES only: Netherlands, France, Hong Kong, etc. A quick LinkedIn search gives you tons of results.  Delegations get you a subsidized booth, press attention you’d hardly get alone, and a cohort of founders going through the same thing. The application effort is low compared to what you get. The catch is timing: CES delegations typically close applications in September. 4. Get feedback from founders who exhibited in your industry Summer is the one season when people answer cold messages. Search LinkedIn for founders who exhibited at the last edition of the trade show you’re considering using its hashtag. Ask for 15 minutes. Ask three questions: what did it cost in total, how many qualified conversations did they have, and would they do it again. Three of these calls will teach you more than most post-event reports the organizer publishes.  That’s what we learned interviewing ReSnack founders. 5. Run a pitch practice session with your peers, and moderate it Get five founder friends on a call or around a table. Everyone pitches, everyone gives feedback. You moderate. The pitching part is obvious. The moderating part is the underrated one: keeping time, asking follow-ups, managing the room. That’s a skill you’ll need on every panel you ever join, and nobody teaches it. As Lubomila Jordanova told us on the Selected podcast, small formats with harsh feedback are where you learn to hold an audience. 6. Volunteer at a startup event Unglamorous advice, and one of the best access you’ll ever get. Volunteers see how the machine works from the inside: how speakers get booked, how the VIP room operates, who actually makes decisions. You’ll meet the organizing team, and organizing teams remember people who showed up to work. An obvious one is Slush where 1,800 volunteers come together to produce one of the best startup events on earth: https://slush.org/audience/volunteers  7. Plan a side event for the back-to-office season Every ecosystem has a September event where everyone reappears. For example FDDay in Paris. Don’t compete with the main program. Host a breakfast before it opens or drinks after it closes, 20 to 30 people, one clear theme. Side events cost a fraction of a booth and put you in the host position instead of the badge-wearing position. Start planning now: venues and calendars fill up faster than you’d expect for the first week of September. 8. Budget your 2027 event strategy Nobody wants to open a spreadsheet in July. Do it anyway, because budget season at your company happens whether you participate or not. The mistake founders make is counting the ticket and the flight and stopping there. Every event day requires two preparation days: outreach before, follow-up after. That’s the 2:1 rule, and it changes the math on which events deserve a slot at all.  Pick a maximum of 5 events for 2027. Assign each one a job: sales, hiring, fundraising, or press. If an event has no job, it has no budget line. 9. Check if your summer festival has a business track A growing number of music festivals run pitching sessions or networking programs alongside the main stage. Tomorrowland even hosts a dedicated event around impact & social innovation: Love Tomorrow Summit.  Is the deal flow serious? Sometimes. Is it the most pleasant place you’ll pitch all year? Definitely. If you’re on holiday near one anyway, the marginal cost is a badge upgrade. 10. Rest The circuit restarts in September and doesn’t stop until Christmas. Slush alone will take a week out of your life, and that’s before the follow-up emails. Founders treat rest as a productivity hack, which slightly misses the point. Take actual time off. Turn off the notifications. The events will still be there in September, and so will everyone else, looking exhausted already. Don’t be them. Photo credit: Anik Labreigne on Unsplash + Gemini

la fabrique a nuage la barbe a papa sans sucre qui revolutionne le snacking 1726502154
Startups 4 weeks ago

The founders behind NUAGE, the sugar-free cotton candy rated Nutri-Score A, share their playbook for event strategy, budget, and pipeline ROI. If you’ve walked the aisles of a French food trade show recently, chances are you’ve seen — or tasted — a small cloud of the impossible: cotton candy with zero sugar and a Nutri-Score A. Behind it is Re.Snack, a startup founded in 2023 near Dijon by Vanessa and Florian, on a mission to reinvent confectionery. Their first product, NUAGE, is built on Sucr’A, a proprietary sugar substitute developed with AgroSup Dijon that uses plant fibres (isomalt and inulin) to recreate cotton candy’s signature melt-in-the-mouth texture — without sugar, allergens, colourants, or preservatives. The traction speaks for itself: revenue up from €200K to €7M in two years, distribution from 100 to 5,000 points of sale, more than 15,000 online orders, national TV exposure on M6 — and a reported acquisition offer from Lindt that the founders turned down. They’d rather build a brand than become a subcontractor. A sugar-free, fat-free popcorn is next. But what caught our attention is how they grew. For Re.Snack, trade shows aren’t a marketing expense — they’re the core of the sales machine, with a dedicated budget, pipeline targets, and hard ROI thresholds. So we sat down with the team and asked the five questions every founder should be able to answer about their event strategy. Sesamers: Let’s start with the basics. What role do events play in your sales motion — sourcing net-new pipeline, accelerating open deals, or closing? Re.Snack: Events are our number one growth channel. They generate new business, strengthen relationships with existing customers, and accelerate ongoing opportunities. In the food industry, people buy products, but they also buy the team behind them. Face-to-face interactions build trust much faster than emails or calls. That’s a big claim — number one channel. Does the budget reflect it? What share of your sales & marketing spend goes to events, and what target does it carry? Around 25% of our sales and marketing budget is dedicated to events. We consider them a strategic investment rather than a communication expense. Our objective is that every euro invested generates multiple times its value in qualified commercial opportunities over the following 12 months. Twelve months is a patient window. When you look across the whole portfolio of events, what does the blended pipeline ROI actually come out to? On average, we generate between 8x and 12x pipeline ROI across our major trade shows. Some flagship events, such as SIAL or ISM, can significantly outperform that because they concentrate the world’s key retail buyers in one place. Meetings are easy to count, revenue less so. Which events actually convert — not just into conversations, but into business? The events that convert best are those attended by decision-makers with active buying projects. For us, SIAL Paris, ISM, Snack Show, and major retail buying conventions consistently generate tangible business. Success isn’t measured by the number of meetings, but by the quality of follow-up and execution afterwards. Last one on the numbers: at what point do you decide an event has earned a bigger budget? What’s your threshold for scaling up? We increase investment once an event consistently delivers at least a 5x pipeline ROI and proves it can generate repeatable business over multiple editions. We look at long-term customer value rather than immediate sales, because retail cycles can take several months. Before we let you go — for the food founders reading this, what would be your top 5 events? My top five would be: What founders should take from this Beneath the answers sits a playbook any startup can copy, whatever the industry. Events have a job description. Re.Snack doesn’t attend trade shows to “be visible” — events source new business, deepen existing relationships, and accelerate open deals. If you can’t name the job an event does in your sales motion, you have travel expenses, not a strategy. The budget is an envelope with a target attached. A quarter of sales & marketing spend, set deliberately and measured against a pipeline expectation over 12 months. No target, no budget. ROI is measured blended, on a realistic clock. Individual events fluctuate; the portfolio number — 8–12x pipeline-to-cost in Re.Snack’s case — is what tells you whether the channel works. And the attribution window matches the sales cycle: judging a trade show by orders signed on the show floor would kill investments that pay off two quarters later. Conversion beats meetings, and follow-up is where ROI is made. The filter is decision-makers with active buying projects — not badge scans. The event budget implicitly includes the week after the show, not just the days of it. Budget growth follows proven return. A 5x floor, plus repeatability across multiple editions, before a single extra euro flows. One great year doesn’t unlock more spend; a pattern does. Run this way, events stop being a cost centre with nice catering — and become a growth channel with receipts. Company background via nuage.resnack.fr, France 3 Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, and Traces Écrites News.

Sesame Summit 2026 Workshop
Events 1 month ago

This week I read about a hackathon claiming 6,000 attendees over a single weekend. The venues hosting it can’t accommodate more than 1,000 people. Nobody in the comments asked how the math worked. That gap between the claim and the room is what this article is about. For most event organizers, event metrics are marketing, not measurement. Once you understand how attendance numbers are built, why ROI stays a black box, and why matchmaking is often bad on purpose, you’ll read every post-event press release differently. Here’s a decoder. The vocabulary nobody explains to you The event industry has precise definitions. It just doesn’t advertise them. UFI, the global association of the exhibition industry, publishes calculation standards and auditing rules for all of them. Independent bodies like ABC audit against them. Here’s the short version. Visitor. One human being who came to the event. If I attend all three days, I’m one visitor. Visit. One entry through the doors. My three days now count as three visits. UFI accepts both figures in its audits, defines visits as visitors plus repeat visits, and requires the term used to be clearly indicated on the audit certificate. Guess which number ends up on the homepage. Attendee / participant. No standard definition. These are the marketing words. They can mean visitors, visits, registrants, exhibitor staff, speakers, press, students or the organizer’s own team, in any combination. When you read “50,000 participants,” you’re reading a number with no agreed method behind it. Registrant. Someone who signed up. Free registration events love this one, because no-show rates of 30 to 50 percent are common and registrations cost nothing to inflate. Exhibitor. Elastic too. UFI distinguishes direct exhibitors, who contract with the organizer, from co-exhibitors, who are part of a shared stand (think country pavilions). Both count. Daily exhibitor. A company present for a single day, typical in startup zones and rotating programs. A startup using a shared booth on day 2 only counts as one exhibitor, exactly like the anchor brand that paid for 400 sqm across the full show. Pavilion / delegation. A block of space booked by one entity, usually a national export agency, a region or a corporate, then filled with smaller companies. One contract, one invoice, 25 logos. Pavilions are how organizers cluster small booths into themed areas, and how “1,200 exhibitors” can describe wildly different realities. Net vs. gross exhibition space. Net is the square meters actually rented. Gross includes aisles, catering areas and that giant entrance arch. As a rule of thumb: net space is 50% of gross space at an average show.  The prosumer padding One more layer on the attendance side. Many events count audiences that are professional on paper only. Student groups bused in for the afternoon. Employees of a corporate partner who run one workshop on day 3. Startup founders’ plus-ones. Locals with a discounted badge. I’m not saying these people have no place at events. Some of the best energy on a show floor comes from them. But if you’re an exhibitor paying for access to buyers, a headline number that mixes procurement directors with second-year students is not relevant. Ask for the audience breakdown by profile. If the organizer can’t produce one, that tells you something too. The ROI black box Here’s the uncomfortable part: almost nobody wants to know if an event actually performs. CEIR, the research arm of the U.S. industry association IAEE, paused its exhibitor spend research for years and only resumed it in late 2025. Its 2026 Marketing Spend Decision Report finds that management evaluates exhibition ROI mainly on lead volume and post-show closed deals, and documents a gap between what practitioners track and what leadership actually cares about. The industry’s reference dataset on exhibitor spending had not been refreshed since 2017. Read that again: the largest B2B marketing channel went eight years without updated benchmarks. The exhibitor side confirms the fog. Vendelux’s 2026 B2B Events Survey of 120+ marketing and events leaders found that 86 percent can’t accurately attribute ROI to events, and 98 percent struggle to justify event spend to leadership. Yet 80 percent are maintaining or growing their sponsorships anyway.  Organizers benefit from this fog. Some only release their data points after the event is over, when your booking decision for next year is already locked in early-bird pricing. Others share nothing beyond the headline number. Try asking for the seniority breakdown of last edition’s visitors, or the ratio of buyers to service providers walking the aisles. I wrote before that founders systematically underestimate what events cost them, hence my 2:1 preparation rule. The other side of that equation is just as broken: they can’t estimate what events return, because the data to do so is withheld. The GDPR excuse When pushed, some organizers invoke GDPR as the reason they can’t share more. Let’s be precise. GDPR restricts sharing personal data: names, emails, badge scans tied to individuals. It says nothing about aggregated, anonymized statistics. “42 percent of our visitors have purchasing authority” contains zero personal data. An organizer who can’t tell you that either doesn’t know it or doesn’t want you to know it. Neither answer is reassuring. If startups are solving it, ask why organizers aren’t A whole category of companies now exists to answer a question organizers could answer themselves: was this event worth it? Full disclosure: at Sesamers we’re building mytradeshow.ai on this exact gap, so I have a horse in this race. Here are five others working the same seam: Sit with the logic for a second. Organizers gather and process the registration data, the badge scans, the floor plans, the exhibitor contracts. They are the best-placed actors in the world to measure event performance. If third parties have to reconstruct that picture from the outside, it’s because the people holding the data have decided that transparency isn’t always in their interest. Bad matchmaking is a feature One last thing, and it’s my favorite. Whenever an event’s matchmaking is mediocre, don’t

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