Stockholm Tech Fest: The Local's Blog
Tech-heads, investors and entrepreneurs flooded the Waterfront for the STHLM Tech Fest on Friday. We live blogged the whole thing.
@PoppermostProd wonderful presentation. Great graphics, compelling figured and strong narrative. Very inspiring! #sthlmtechfest
— Alex Budak (@AlexBudak) September 5, 2014
The kings of rock gaming :) RT @j_crona: These guys rock! @RockScienceTV at #sthlmtechfest #sthlmtech pic.twitter.com/brOUJieYnS
— Rock Science (@RockScienceTV) September 5, 2014
difference between a berlin conf and #sthlmtechfest - coffee comes in not ridiculous cups and tastes not awful
— Simon Kendall (@sighmoan_says) September 5, 2014
It's @NatalBrz - one of The Local's feature bloggers - and she's hosting a panel at the #sthlmtechfest #sthlmtech pic.twitter.com/kdac1SejfD
— The Local Sweden (@TheLocalSweden) September 5, 2014
11.15: SOCIAL MEDIA
11.30 FUTURE OF COMMERCE
New app #dreams reinvents banking and totally disrupts customer view on saving. #sthlmtechfest #sthlmtech
— Micke von Holst (@mickevonholst) September 5, 2014
The Americans on stage leave even the most talkative Swedes far far behind :) #sthlmtech #sthlmtechfest
— Magnus Hult (@hult) September 5, 2014
12.17 JUST BEFORE LUNCH
The commerce lads are still discussing the future of banking, saving and selling. But now Per Roman introduces one of his 'favourite CEOs'. It's one of Stockholm's most celebrated and inspiring expats, Lesley Pennington, founder of Bemz. Bemz sells covers for Ikea sofas. Simple but brilliant. She tells us that e-commerce is now being replaced by 'me-commerce'. Personalisation and relevance.
Per Roman tells Lesley that "if I were a brand man I would rename your company 'pimpmysofa.com'. Lesley will consider it, no doubt.
What do the panel think of Bemz? Hard to tell: they are mainly using Lesley's talk as a vehicle to talk about their own businesses. But the audience is impressed.
How could I have never heard of @bemz ? Packaging generic ikea products to be personal for you. The future is #MEcommerce #sthlmtechfest
— Assia Grazioli Venie (@assiagrazioli) September 5, 2014
12.30 LUNCH: WHAT'S STOCKHOLM'S SECRET?
We're going to hit the food trucks and we'll be asking delegates a simple question: what's Stockholm's secret? Why are so many amazing companies coming out of this city? Is it the air? The water? The universities? The wifi? Tweet us @thelocalsweden with #sthlmtechfest if you know the answer.
The hunger! The pain! RT @JesperBylund: Lunch? Lunch right? Right!?! #hunger #sthlmtechfest
— Sandra Terobi Grosse (@Terobi) September 5, 2014
13.00: TYLER SHARES STOCKHOLM'S SECRET
Just bumped into the organizer of the event -- Tyler Crowley -- and asked him to reveal Stockholm's secret.
13.55 PRINCE DANIEL IS IN THE HOUSE
Would everyone please be upstanding. Thank you. You may sit.
14.00 GROWTH
We all want some, right? The Local had 4.5m readers last month - 50 percent up on August 2013. That's growth. But others are having a bit of it too. Bloglovin, for example, which is exploding following the demise of Google's RSS reader. Klarna and Truecaller too - also Stockholm start-ups. And Tesla, confounding the car industry's view of its cars.
And they're here on stage to tell us all about it via the now-established medium of four more startup pitches.
Here we go.
14.15 - A FAMILIAR FACE
Just bumped into Natalia Brzezinski from the US embassy. She's one of our feature bloggers, and she was a panelist today. And she's enjoying the show.
14.16 GROWTH CONTINUED
Sinch is app to app communications. Andreas from Sinch, which has been spun out of Rebtel, says they are taking the complexity out of the TelCo world and leaving all the magic. Make of that what you will. Pay Sinch a visit here:
Tyler is wondering whether Truecaller and Sinch have something in the pipeline. They both deny it but do confess to being 'very good friends'.
I think Apple will buy @mapillary to improve their maps #sthlmtechfest (or I hope they will)
— Maral (@maralkalajian) September 5, 2014
14.30 THIS GROWTH SESSION JUST KEEPS ON GROWING
Now Stockholm's Lifesum is giving its perspective on growth. With a million users a month they have a story to tell. "Always swing in weight classes much heavier than our actual one." You also need to "love your users" and "understand your platform to maximise distribution". Joy Marcus of Bloglovin likes what she hears: product appeal is crucial - it all starts with a great product. If you want to know the secret to Lifesum's success, here's where you'll find them:
Interestingly, Tyler is emphasising that these are all Stockholm companies but their representatives are quick to focus on the global. As Andreas from Sinch puts it: here in Sweden you can't be comfortable in your home market. Want more Stockholm secrets?
Victor Suarez, a Spanish developer at Fishbrain, told The Local earlier that Stockholm's secret is the attitude of people here. "They aim for excellence in everything they do," he said.
Back to the session. Detectify are here boasting about having hacked Google and dozens of other major organisations. That's one way to sell your services.
Andreas from Sinch: "I assume you're selling to CTOs. Isn't this like telling them that they're not very good at their jobs?" No, says the Detectify dude: we sell to lower level developers so the CTOs don't even have to worry about it. Nice answer.
And the Google hack wasn't as shady as it sounds. Google actually paid Detectify $10,000 for the hack. Gatecrash the Detectify party here:
14.50 INSTABRIDGE
No reason why they should get their own heading, but this is another amazing Stockholm start-up. It's a wifi app which lets you connect to all other Instabridge users' wifi networks. And it shows you all the other wifi spots near you. It even gets your phone to direct you towards free wifi when you're not online.
Instabridge's biggest challenge is... getting growth. But its users seem committed. "We have one guy in Mexico who has run around adding 300 hundred networks in the last month," says Instabridge CEO and founder Niklas Agevik.
Find free wifi, even offline, with Stockholm based company @Instabridge #sthlmtech #sthlmtechfest pic.twitter.com/pytzIsH92I
— Invest Stockholm (@investstockholm) September 5, 2014
Borrow Instabridge's wifi here:
Uber gets its own headline too, not least because the presentation is by Stockholm general manager (and one of The Local's first employees) Robin Reznik. Uber is one of the world's fastest growing companies. Most people think of Uber as a taxi-like outfit - but they see themselves as a mobility company. Cars, helicopters, boats - whatever it takes. And Robin announces - to a spontaneous round of applause - that Uber is now launching a ride-sharing service in Stockholm.
UberPOP is in beta but it's 60% cheaper than regular taxis. That's what people want to hear.
Robin offers everyone in the audience 200 SEK off their next Uber ride. Although he only leaves the code on screen for about three seconds.
Uber just announced that they are launching ride sharing in Sthlm very shortly! Brilliant news!! #uberpop #Uber #sthlmtechfest @Uber
— Åsa Sandberg (@asa_sandberg) September 5, 2014
15.10 THE SECRET TO STOCKHOLM
We mingled with the crowd, asking people to share the secrets behind Stockholm's success.
15.25 ADVERTISING
We've got an advertising panel on now, featuring heads from Widespace, Videoplaza, Facebook, Schibsted, and Klout. Stay tuned.
15.35 PRINCE WATCH
Not sure if Prince Daniel is still here. There was a big rush for some free ice cream five minutes ago. Perhaps he slipped out.
"It's called Facebook, you may have heard about it," says Facebook global marketer. Good marketing? #sthlmtechfest:
— The Local Sweden (@TheLocalSweden) September 5, 2014
The panel seems relatively impressed. The engagement is fantastic, says the Facebook chap.
As simple as this. #sthlmtech #sthlmtechfest pic.twitter.com/JksoBsSbLQ
— Kriszti Tóth (@TKrisztike) September 5, 2014
Narrative from Narrative on Vimeo.
The Local's coverage of Stockholm Tech Fest was made possible with support from Stockholm Business Region.
Photos: TT news agency
This content was paid for by an advertiser and produced by The Local's Creative Studio.
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