Who would have expected a day with so much new and innovative information? Well… we sure did!
We just concluded the first day and we can’t wait to find out what other big surprises we’ll encounter on the second day of the event. The 9th edition of Techsylvania takes place between 28–29 of June, in a hybrid mode, allowing local and international tech enthusiasts to take part in the most exciting tech event in Eastern Europe. First day of 2022’s Techsylvania edition was a blast. After 2 years of virtual-only events, Techsylvania is back with a both in-person and virtual event reuniting founders, CEOs, technical experts and digital innovation professionals from successful tech companies around the world. The 9th edition brought together, on the first day of the event, more than 30 speakers who shared their experiences, innovations and valuable information to thousands of national and international participants.
On the first day of the event, we had extremely enthusiastic and eager guests for communication and networking. These included Silicon Valley corporations and innovative start-ups in the tech industry. Attendees had the opportunity to follow them on the 2 main stages of the event, participate in Workshops and address all their curiosities in interactive Q&A sessions.
The grand opening of the first day started on Center Stage with Mark Porter, Chief Technical Officer (CTO) of MongoDB. He had a structured and clear message about organizational culture and its importance for scaling companies. One of the most interesting aspects presented was about how an organization’s culture is made up of the unspoken and unwritten practices and rules which drive how humans and systems act — and react.
Shortly after, another interesting and highly skilled speakers followed on Center Stage, eager to share their knowledge with the participants, in a back to normal context, after 2 years when the pandemic limited such events. Margaret Hollendoner (Google) live streamed about the Product Development at Fitbit and achieving a healthy way of life with less effort, while Aniela Crișan (OLX) introduced us to a Team Driven development mentality. And so much more. She taught us about the mantra of Test-Driven Development and how the team is keeping the operational excellence by continuous learning, testing and setting sustainable, people-centered values.
Fast forward, after the lunch break, Ciprian Zamfirescu, Digital Transformation & Innovation Manager at Vodafone Romania clarified the way technology can revolutionize every industry, including the Telecom. He spoke about systems automation, the internet of things, cloud analytics for automated network planning and optimization, 5G, drones and other aspects that can be integrated in the process of migration to complete inter connectivity.
Another highly awaited speaker on the center stage was Daniel Myers, Senior Developer Relations Manager at Snowflake inc. What have we learned from his speech? That data application or data driven-applications provide the rich, speedy insights, automation and integration that data-driven businesses are using to gain competitive advantages. And we really need a solid competitive advantage to win the clients hearts and money.
And if ”studying behavior more than money” sounds like something you would do, it is clear that you already paid attention to Josh Little (Volley) speech. In today’s market, it is all about demand and supply, so testing and understanding your target audience becomes such valuable assets. His speech, Stuck like glue by building products that users can’t live without, was a must for every company, for start-ups to international corporations. We really hope you didn’t miss it.
After the lunch break, Zoltan Vardy shared with us his secrets of The Launch Code, his 9-step business development framework that helps B2B tech startups boost their revenues by adapting corporate planning, sales, and management techniques to a startup environment.
One of the awaited subjects of the first day was about the crypto bear market, or How to survive crypto winter: Founding, Funding and Building Web3 companies that last. Wui Ngiap Foo & Henry Foo from Ethlas matched the expectations of our participants and taught us what investing in game platforms & cryptocurrency really means, how does its volatility translate on an individual level and its impact on platforms or companies. Nevertheless, they got a little deeper on the subject, discussing the future we are heading towards and what percentage of the market reaction can be anticipated.
Mansoor Ahmed-Rengers, co-founder and CEO at OpenOrigins spoke about authenticity in the age of disinformation, followed on center stage by Carlo Driussi — Executive Vice President & COO Unicredit Bank — responsible for global banking services division, with a hot topic about the culture of innovation.
Another challenging talk on the Center Stage was the conference session with Razvan Roman from TwoTap and Zoltan Vardy from The Launch Code. They debated about A Founders Journey: Europe to the US, startup to exit, entrepreneur to investor and all the participants could express their curiosities about this topic in the Q&A session. Adrian Pica, the product management leader from Bolt was virtually with us and he shared amazing insights about the economics of digital marketplaces.
Our final speakers on the Center Stage gave us very insightful information on various topics. First of all, Zach Coelius, the founder of entrepreneurial early stage capital for technology startups — Coelius Capital from whom we learned a new business tactic: choose something you are good at and you can describe it sincerely & clearly within a single sentence. After 6 long years of constantly inviting him to join us, Stan Chudnovsky from NFX has honored us with his presence on Techsylvania’s stage and made every second count with his valuable lessons on how to get from investing in early teams to running the large organizations at Meta, the importance of feedback, coherent message and making sure you get your entire team on the same page. A big dream is what gets you on in uncertain times like these. And this type of attitude is contagious. You need to match up big ambitions in order to be successful — but first, sit down and figure out what you want to achieve with your ambition.
Last, but not least, Alina Vandenberghe — Co-founder & Co-CEO Chili Piper — the latest Romanian unicorn company in the United States, gave us billion dollars advice on how to build a durable strategy around a completely remote company idea, measure success and where to go after achieving everything, while still managing to deliver it all in a modest manner.
That was all. But just for the Center Stage. On the Impact Stage, the speakers were also delivering great knowledge, word by word. With the stage moderated by Irina Obushtarova (the Recursive), Aaron Lee & Dexter Ligot-Gordon (Swarm) broke the ice with insightful information about how CTOs and CEOs should collaborate in early stage startups. Going further, Andrei Dudoiu, CEO Seedblink shared tips & tricks about collaborative work of european investors and tech startups. The next speaker on the Impact Stage was Oana Florescu from Youtube who had a great talk about fast-growing XFN teams and scaling tech products, remaining also very passionate about her work in this industry. And this really shows in everything we do, isn’t it?
When it comes to keeping an eye open for context and seeking new perspectives Deniz Tuncalp from Istanbul Technical University gave us the best advice. We discussed cultural changes and how they could help us to develop the next startup triangle, following his path. Shortly after, Tomer Dean, representing Audiolabs, taught us a very valuable lesson: don’t fall in love with your idea and start the r&d before validating the product with real users. Do you agree with him? We sure do.
Our final guest on the Impact Stage was FIX Cluj — the first innovation fund dedicated to financing the bold entrepreneurial initiatives of young creative minds. They had to make a tough decision: who will be the next 4 winners of Final Demo Day? After 3 hours of analyzing pitches and deliberating, FIX Cluj decided: Badea Neaoș, Magic Team, OHMYDOG and Manuscrito deserve the funds for developing their businesses. Such a beautiful way to end a day! And for the participants who didn’t get the prizes, they sure got some extremely valuable information from our speakers — and maybe some new wonderful connections to get their projects going further.
The Q&A stage and the technical workshop stage got us a deeper understanding of the digital world of tomorrow, through applicable processes and various contexts, focused on all the hottest topics there are. Diego Freniche Brito & Jorge Ortiz Fuentes (MongoDB) taught us how to Write an Android App with Sync from Scratch, Aaron Lee & Dexter Ligot-Gordon (Swarm) guided us on some Creative Tension: How Should CTOs and CEOs Collaborate in Early Stage Startups? Mihaela Lungu from About You shed some light on how to Craft authentic e-commerce shops: “Brands can personalize their shops, including language, Add to cart and when we implement new features their shops won’t crash.” In the end, Flaviu Samarghitan & Mathias Maciossek (Neurolabs) challenged the visual wizards out there with automate visual tasks without training any algorithms tips & tricks.
That was all for the first day, fellow techsylvanians! Are you ready for another one tomorrow? We will bring some fresh insightful info — you bring your A game! Do we have a deal?