Web Summit is back in Lisbon from 9 to 12 November, and guess who’s gonna be there? Of course, BUPR is!
The full event agenda has now dropped, but there’s just an issue. Going through it might take longer than your phone battery can stay alive. With hundreds of sessions to pick from, our corns thought to sift through them all and highlight a few we’re especially looking forward to. They are in running order, and may overlap a little, so feel free to pick-n-mix from the list and build your own days around it.
Our picks aim to stay abreast of the big picture. In the mix we have where tech is heading right now: AI agents, physical AI and robotics, defence, quantum, identity and the infrastructure underneath all of it. We also made room for fintech, SaaS and VC, because the same forces are landing there too, disrupting those spaces (but perhaps not in the way everyone thought).
To learn even more, click on the links to the agenda. Obrigado!
1. The open-source advantage
Closed models get the headlines. Open ones are quietly doing a lot of the work inside real businesses, although they are getting more and more discussed on podcasts and other media, and this session sets out to explain why: control over your data, lower compute bills, faster building.
With two founders and an investor sharing the stage, the case should get tested from more than one side. And we do like a good argument!
Tuesday 10 November, 10:20, Centre Stage
Key Speakers: Eric Jing (Co-founder & CEO, Genspark), Dahai Li (Co-founder & CEO, ModelBest), Rohit Sharma (Partner, True Ventures)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
2. AI: your new news editor?
Picture an AI agent searching, gathering and summarising the news for people who never visit a homepage. This is already happening, but… who is the editor then? This session asks what that does to how news is made, distributed and paid for.
Not only a fascinating topic, but one close to (our intellectual) home! And nothing makes us happier than getting clients into the media. So hearing Reuters, AP, Le Monde and the South China Morning Post answer it on one stage is an easy yes.
Tuesday 10 November, 11:25, Centre Stage
Key Speakers: Paul Bascobert (President, Reuters News), Julie Pace (SVP and Executive Editor, Associated Press), Louis Dreyfus (CEO, Le Monde), Chung-Yan Chow (Editor-in-chief, South China Morning Post)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
3. The agentic internet: Who controls the web?
More and more of what happens online no longer involves a human clicking anything. Cloudflare co-founder and CEO Matthew Prince talks about what that means for control, attribution and value on the web, and what it takes to keep it open. Cloudflare was already a major internet player, but AI has catapulted it into a major shaper of the future.
Could there be anyone better than Nick Thompson to join in? A legend of tech and media, we’re not ashamed of admitting we’re fans of his.
Tuesday 10 November, 11:45, Centre Stage
Key Speakers: Matthew Prince (Co-founder & CEO, Cloudflare), Nick Thompson (CEO, The Atlantic)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
4. Postmodern warfare: How cheap technology is disrupting the battlefield
Drones, software and off-the-shelf technology are now taking on weapons that cost millions, sometimes billions. David versus Goliath, with a firmware update. The panel asks whether the advantage has moved from expensive platforms to cheap, adaptable ones, and what that does to defence, deterrence and geopolitics.
Defence tech is a sector that rose out of nothing into one of the most important by money invested, with good reason, so it’s always good to get the commercial and the political sides of this in the same room.
Tuesday 10 November, 11:55, Stage 11 (Policy Summit)
Key Speakers: Al Carns (British Labour MP and former Minister for the Armed Forces), Gillian Tett (Editor-at-large, US, Financial Times), Al Nekrews (Founder and CEO, Marcurius), Bogusław Chrabota (Editor in Chief & Member of Board, Gremi Media Group)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
5. The new geopolitics of venture capital
Money (as well as goods and more) used to cross borders with little fuss. Sovereign AI mandates, trade barriers and shifting supply chains have changed that, and this panel looks at how investors deploy capital and pick founders in the middle of it.
How VCs think is always key to understand in order to (try to) foresee the future of the startup world, so we want to hear how the people holding the big, fat cheques are adjusting.
Tuesday 10 November, 12:00, Stage 5 (Venture Summit)
Key Speakers: Philippe Tibi (Head of Initiative, Tibi Initiative), Larry Li (Founder & Managing Partner, Amino Capital), Elena Casas-Montanez (Reporter, Reuters)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
6. What happens when AI meets computing at the deepest level of nature?
Although other topics are currently keeping this relatively quiet, quantum computing and AI are on a collision course. This talk is about what will happens when they finally meet, where today’s AI may run into limits, and how quantum could widen what it is able to discover.
It will be fascinating to learn about all the possibilities and challenges – we just hope we can keep up with the conversation!
Tuesday 10 November, 14:45, Stage 13 (AI Summit)
Key Speakers: James Palles-Dimmock (CEO, Quantum Motion Technologies), Zhiyuan Liu (Quantum Researcher, Tsinghua University), Emil Protalinski (Editor, Hard Coded and Techmeme)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
7. When AI leaves the screen
AI has conquered our screens. Next stop: factories and workplaces. Skild AI co-founder and president Abhinav Gupta will talk about physical AI, the idea of one general-purpose brain running many different robots, and what it will take to get intelligent machines into everyday life.
Robotics is undoubtedly one of the hottest sectors now that AI is set to unlock so many possibilities, and one to keep a (human) eye on.
Tuesday 10 November, 16:05, Centre Stage
Key Speaker: Abhinav Gupta (Co-founder & President, Skild AI)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
8. When anyone can build software, what happens next?
For a long time the hard part of solving a problem was finding someone who could build the solution. Lovable co-founder and CTO Fabian Hedin looks at what changes when the person closest to the problem can ship the fix themselves.
A little while back, many were sounding the SaaSpocalypse alarms. While that didn’t really end up materialising, it’s undeniable that the rules of the game have changed. Thought leaders from the industry are talking about moats pivoting to distribution, taste or even vision and ambition. Never mind the shakeup in product, design and development roles. We can’t wait to hear what Lovable’s CTO has to say!
Wednesday 11 November, 10:00, Centre Stage
Key Speaker: Fabian Hedin (Co-founder & CTO, Lovable)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
9. Building profitable neobanks at scale
Neobanks spent their first era buying customers with venture money and slick apps. The second era is about unit economics, and the small matter of actually making a profit.
Fintech is one of those sectors Europe is really good at and perhaps has some unfair advantages, ironically, thanks to regulation. And Starling is one of the poster childs of neobanks. Also a great occasion to simply keep up with fintech. We’re in!
Wednesday 11 November, 11:20, Stage 8 (MoneyConf)
Key Speakers: Raman Bhatia (Group CEO, Starling Bank), Chris Newlands (Executive Editor, Financial Times)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
10. Teaching AI to see the world
AI can describe the world in words. Black Forest Labs co-founder Andreas Blattmann will explore the next steps – namely, machines that understand it as it is, made of objects, movement, space, sound, and cause and effect.
The keynote covers how the company is building that visual layer and how it feeds into physical AI. It is also the European voice among our physical AI picks, with exciting milestones in recent times and poised to be one of the continent’s winners.
Wednesday 11 November, 12:50, Centre Stage
Key Speaker: Andreas Blattmann (Co-founder, Black Forest Labs)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
11. Building the infrastructure for AI everywhere
In this last few weeks, this has been more ‘visible’ than ever. AI is shifting from models we query to agents that reason and act all day, and the computing underneath has to keep up. Arm CEO Rene Haas asks whether compute, energy and data centres can do it, and what countries and companies need to capture the value.
A good reminder that AI is not just an interface on a screen, rather, that’s only the tip pf the pyramid.
Wednesday 11 November, 16:30, Centre Stage
Key Speaker: Rene Haas (CEO, Arm Ltd.)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
12. World models for the physical world
Some of the biggest minds in AI keep highlighting how large language models (LLMs) won’t be enough if AI will truly transform our economies and achieve that takeoff. We therefore need… world models!
A machine that works in the physical world needs a model of how that world behaves. Cristian Bodnar’s keynote looks at how world models help machines reason about their surroundings, predict how things change and decide under uncertainty.
Thursday 12 November, 11:20, Stage 13 (AI Summit)
Key Speaker: Cristian Bodnar (Founding member, Prometheus)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
13. An AI identity crisis
AI agents now access systems, handle data and make transactions, which leaves cybersecurity with a plain question: how do you prove an agent is what it says it is, and who is accountable when it acts? The panel discusses digital identities for agents and what trust infrastructure means for financial services.
Cybersecurity, financial fraud were already a challenge. AI only makes things more interesting.
Thursday 12 November, 11:50, Stage 8 (Cybersecurity Summit)
Key Speakers: Andrew Sever (Co-founder and CEO, Sumsub), Jacob Sever (Co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer, Sumsub), Marina Khaustova (COO & Executive Director, Crystal Intelligence), Robert Booth (Technology Editor, The Guardian UK)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
14. How physical AI is transforming agriculture
A few hundred years ago, you and I would have probably been born into a family of farmers. Thanks to technology, farming techniques, machines and chemistry, production was possible (and safer and healthier) with far less people. Economies boomed. And now with AI? What will happen this time around?
Oishii co-founder and CEO Hiroki Koga talks about what happens when machine intelligence meets living biology: algorithms, robotics and biology working together, and what that means for farm jobs and food production. We can still call it farm to table, but with a few robots in between.
Thursday 12 November, 14:50, Stage 4 (Commerce Summit)
Key Speakers: Hiroki Koga (Co-Founder & CEO, Oishii), Vitus Spehar (Creator, Under The Desk News)
See this session on the Web Summit agenda
Ready for Web Summit?
If you are there from 9 to 12 November, send us a message on LinkedIn and we will find time for a coffee between talks.
See you in Lisbon!
