I just finished my first Slush event in Singapore and I am a convert. Why haven’t I heard of this 9 year old movement from Finland? Well now – everyone will hear about them and their upcoming events in Shanghai, Tokyo and Finland of course.
Conferences are hard to pull off. There are so many moving parts before and during the day/s itself. I was a volunteer or volunteer manager at least 10 conferences, am sponsorship director for Sheworx LA Chapter – watch for our investor day in Spring 2018 and was one of the sponsorship directors for Wisdom 2.0 Asia; and have been media for more events than I can now imagine – my first was Collision in Vegas.
Slush Singapore was huge. Three stages, a startup competition, multiple partner prizes and a very international community. Buzz was in the air from the moment we entered and people are still dancing/networking as I write this.
A glimpse of my day would be the best way for me to capture the experience.
Marina Bay Sands has always been one of the coolest iconic conference venues in Singapore. I arrived early enough to greet and thank Peter Vesterbacka for setting this up. As well as going ga ga over Estonia with Vice President of the Estonian Parliament about Estonia, Taavi Roivas and their e-citizenship and how I am definitely spending a month there July 2018 with Mindvalley U (more on that later).
I was waiting on Emmie Chang whose enthusiasm for life and all things cryptocurrency had my fellow reporters and I all ears. This is a woman on a mission you have to watch . I will feature her on a series of finance and ICO soon. I was also kindly invited to interview Julian Hosp. Thankfully I will see him tomorrow at Women in Tech and could gather my thoughts around ICO which I only learnt about two weeks ago at Crowdinvest Summit in LA. Bumping into Chris Abshire of Fenox Venture Capital and sponsor of the first prize for the Startup Competition, helped me frame the 2 major questions. Will the token be considered a securities and what are the investor status? Accredited or non?
The main point? I learnt everything in a few hours. I looked for answers and I found questions I still had yet to ask- simply because others were asking them for me. The crowdsourcing of brains interested in startups was simply spectacular. Everyone was accessible. Julian spent much time chatting with anyone keen to ask questions and the enthusiasm of Bay McLaughlin boomed across the hall. Abhishek Gupta of Circlelife was so passionate as he recruited talents from the crowd to tackle teleco woes.
The desire and hunger filled the room.
But what most impressed me from the beginning to the end was the commitment of their hundred over volunteers.
Singapore needed some Finnish snow flakes
We melt well together
Thank you Slush Singapore Team. Invite me back for more please.
