Startup Week San Diego, like a lot of other places that host similar events, has been billed as a weeklong celebration of entrepreneurship.
Seattle’s UP Global, now part of Techstars, oversees the operation of Startup Week and other programs for tech entrepreneurs across the U.S. and abroad. But while Startup Week San Diego has always collaborated with UP Global, San Diego entrepreneur and Startup Week organizer Austin Neudecker said, “We’ve always been an independent entity.”
Startup Week San Diego is intended to showcase local startups that are focused on innovation in such areas as Software as a Service (SaaS), consumer Internet, mobile technology, hardware, and defense technology.
“The vision I’ve always had for Startup Week San Diego is to be the voice of the entrepreneur, and to be building the community and identity to be able to get the resources and help they need to build companies faster,” Neudecker said.
In the four years since he organized San Diego’s first Startup Week, Neudecker said the tech summit has grown from 10 events that drew about 300 people to this year’s spectacle, which features 143 events and is expected to attract between 2,000 and 3,000 attendees.
This year’s Startup Week also has added five new tracks intended to highlight San Diego’s strengths as a startup ecosystem. The new tracks are: biotech (BioSD); craft beer (BrewSD); cybersecurity and defense (SecureSD); graphic design (DesignSD); and San Diego’s crossborder synergies with Tijuana (CrossSD).
The business sessions and workshops begin Monday at 8:15 am, but the opening day celebration won’t begin until later—at 6 pm, to be precise—with the kickoff launch party on the Broadway Pier. The event will feature live music, networking, food, and drinks.
Tickets for this year’s entrepreneurial showfest are available online here.
With 10 tracks and 143 events, however, it can be hard for even dedicated entrepreneurs to know which panel discussion or startup success story to attend. So we’ve decided to highlight some of the Startup Week sessions that entrepreneurs would really want to attend. The events really cover the waterfront—downtown San Diego’s waterfront—and many, if not most of the best events are at night.
Our list is below. For a complete list of the week’s events, you can find the schedule here.
—Monday 6/17 at 4:30pm. A Fire Side Chat with San Diego’s Tech Coast Angels
1 Columbia Place, 401 West A Street
Angel investors from San Diego’s Tech Coast Angels discuss how entrepreneurs in the San Diego-Tijuana region can position themselves to win seed-stage and Series A funding. The speakers, who hail from different industries, also will talk about programs being developed to improve deal flow and the overall startup ecosystem.
—Tuesday 6/14 at 4 pm. Taco Tuesday with Taner
Downtown San Diego Partnership, 401 B Street, #100, 92101
San Diego angel investor Taner Halicioglu, a UC San Diego computer science graduate and one of the early employees at Facebook, has emerged in recent years as one of the region’s most active individual investors. Halicioglu worked with Mark Zuckerberg, Mark Andreessen, and Ben Horowitz, and is a co-founder and partner at Seed San Diego, an informal group of angel investors. Seed founders Allison Long Pettine, Eric Gasser, Kelly Abbott, and Doug Hecht also plan to attend.
—Tuesday 6/14 at 7 pm. Keynote Talk by Upfront Ventures Partner Mark Suster
Copley Symphony Hall, 750 B Street, 92101
As a partner at Los Angeles-based Upfront Ventures, Mark Suster has acquired a reputation for smart, early-stage investments in software and Web-based startups. His interests include
