A guide to EMERGE 2020: speakers, chatroulette and virtual bars

By Guest Author | emerge | May 30, 2020

While countries are just starting to open borders, online is the only way to gain new knowledge, expand the network and attract new investments. Therefore, do not miss this year’s EMERGE conference (June 1–3). The program includes streams with founders and representatives from Coursera, Tesla, Dropbox, MIT Technology Review, Miro, dozens of round tables, and many formats for networking — from casino-like chatroulette to virtual bars with live DJ performances. The geography of participants this year is pretty wide – people from 30+ countries will attend the online event.

Emerge Minsk 2020, digital conference

It’s pretty uncomfortable to attend the online conference during the full one day, thus the agenda was distributed across three days in blocks of 4-6 hours. Almost all activities will begin in the afternoon Minsk time (GMT +3). To ensure audience engagement, a Q&A session will occupy 50% of the speakers’ time. Round tables are designed in the chamber format (15-20 people).

For Tech Professionals

The cross-cutting theme of the BUILD & GROW stream is building a global tech product and its scaling to the global markets. Product managers, product designers, CTOs and engineers from Netflix, SoundCloud, TransferWise, Farfetch, Google, Facebook, NVIDIA and others will share their experience and use cases. Not professional speakers, but “doers” — practitioners with extensive experience, successful and known in their field will be a part of this stream.

How to get the maximum:

  • Sign up for workshops with tech specialists from Microsoft, Google, Preply, Macpaw, Wargaming, round tables with leaders of the grocery community, go to the Speakeasy Room — a special room that mimics the real “lobby” or “smoking room”. Moreover, the speakers will also drop in there.

For Startups

Startups are looking forward to participating in EMERGE because of its startup pitching contest EMERGE CHALLENGE with a cash prize  € 10,000. This year EMERGE CHALLENGE partners  are the Flint Capital venture capital fund, telecom operator MegaFon, VTB Bank and Chivas.

The Belarusian network of business angels Angels Band has gathered a syndicate and intends to invest up to € 200,000 (or in different words: offer Term Sheet) in four startups from the EMERGE pipeline. The lead investor will be Cyrill Golub, a participant in most Angels Band deals.

Also, EMERGE has specially designed for startups the UNICORN stream. Its main topics are ranging from global scaling (e.g. how to increase annual income from $ 20 mln to $ 600 mln), working with corporations (representatives from MegaFon, MTS Startup Hub, VTB Bank will share useful cases) to surviving during a pandemic.  Among the participants of the stream, there will be Andrey Khusid, founder and CEO of Miro startup (the company raised $ 50 mln in April), Hovhannes Avoyan, founder and CEO of PicsArt unicorn, Arkadiy Dobkin, CEO of EPAM, Bruno Moraes, Wayra tech hub manager with offices in 10 countries.

How to get the maximum:

  • Carefully go through the list of investors — in which companies invest, at what stages, to train the pitch.
  • Sign up for mentoring sessions with product managers from global tech companies and leaders of international accelerators and incubators.

For investors

For investors, EMERGE will host the closed Venture night stream, which is designed for a limited number of participants. The two-day program includes panel discussions with partners from Flint Capital, Hoxton Ventures, the innovative division of Microsoft M12, TA Ventures, Acrobator Ventures. Communication in the format of fireside chats with a partner of the Atomico fund (in February raised $ 820 mln; considered the largest European fund). The exhibition of scaleups at Startup Alley, pitches of the five best startups of the later stages.

The cherry on the pie — a presentation by Peter Cowley, President of the European Business Angels Network EBAN (invested in 70+ companies, return on investment – 107x). Also, Tim Draper, one of the pioneers of venture capital, an early investor in Twitch, Tesla, Coinbase, Robinhood, SpaceX, founder of investment funds Draper Associates and Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ). The investor will share his opinion on what the future of the venture industry will be and will answer questions from Venture Night participants. Mr Draper’s speech will be held in an open interview format. It will be led by Yana Abramova, Managing Partner of Pretiosum Ventures.

How to get maximum

  • Participate in the conference: EMERGE organizing committee received more than 500 applications from startups from 30+ countries! Venture Passes for investors will be available all days of the conference.
  • Participate in the traditional private party for investors hosted by Flint Capital. 

For Anyone who is interested in what is happening in the world

This year the slogan of the FUTURE scene is #lifeafter. Stream speakers will share their views on how life will be after a pandemic and how coronavirus has already affected different industries: e-commerce, tourism, HR, education, etc. For example, Shravan Goli, CPO Coursera, will tell you what challenges Coursera team faced due to the pandemic (scaling in conditions of sharp surges in demand, the adaptation of products to support the global student community). There will be many unexpected insiders during his talk!

Gideon Lichfield, editor-in-chief of MIT Technology Review, will probably address the most provocative theme of the stream: “The Next COVID Victim: Silicon Valley.” The valley has been shaking for a long time due to techlash — dissatisfaction with the excessive influence of large technology companies like Apple or Google. The coronavirus epidemic, according to Lichfield, accelerates its decline as the main technology centre in the world.

One of the most interesting stream tracks will be wellness, which focuses on mental health, wellbeing, yoga, mindfulness, meditation and their impact on the world of technology and vice versa. Stream speakers — well-known scientists and world celebrities — will talk about the future of digital healthcare and biomedicine, share a neuroscientific look at biohacking and meditation practices,  discuss the possibilities and advantages of digital people (arguments “ for ”will introduce virtual influencer Aliona Pole).

The peak of the stream will be the discussion about technologies for well-being with the curator of this track, Eddie Stern, personal teacher of yoga actress Gwyneth Paltrow, top model Doutzen Kroes, and Deepak Chopra, the discoverer in the field of integrative medicine and personal transformation, the author of 89 books on spirituality, which are translated into 43 languages. Also, Deepak is a founder of Chopra Global, creator of the popular 21-Day Meditation Experience application (released jointly with TV presenter Oprah Winfrey). By the way, at the end of last year, Deepak introduced its own digital version of Digital Deepak. 

How to get the maximum (for everyone):

  • Participate in all activities of the conference: morning meditation (by the way, it will be hosted by Nico Plauman from Australia, he will also talk about the cult app Insight Timer, which brings together tens of millions of people around the world for a healing practice of meditation), random networking chat roulette, etc. 
  • Visit EMERGE x CHIVAS Afterparty in virtual bars with live performances by DJs from the cult Minsk bar “Hooligan”, live chat and different rooms: from karaoke to the sauna.
  • Refers to everything that happens as a new experience. Moreover, this time EMERGE gives you a unique chance to be in time everywhere: for owners of paid tickets video of performances will be available.