Rally events, and the rest of AI SF

Mixer / networking

A heavy lifting session for founders and builders during Tech Week who'd rather train under iron than sit through wellness seminars. Show up with your program, meet people who actually put in the work, and grab a free shirt if you're fast.

Mixer / networking

Three miles into the Marin Headlands with founders and funders, no slides or pretense, just the kind of conversation that actually happens when wifi disappears. Best ideas don't materialize at desks anyway.

Mixer / networking

A low-key waterfront walk with consumer founders, investors, and builders focused on AI, creativity, and media. Skip the pitches and panels, just good conversation by the Bay followed by coffee.

Mixer / networking

A refreshingly analog way to start your day: jump in the bay at Crissy Field, then warm up with free coffee. Perfect if you need a jolt of something real amid the usual conference circuit.

Mixer / networking

A 5km run at conversational pace mixing founders, investors, and builders before the organizers head to Europe. Walkers welcome, coffee and networking after in SF.

Mixer / networking

A low-key three-mile loop through Golden Gate Park with hardtech founders and engineers, capped by coffee on the hosts. No racing required, no pitches, just movement and shop talk with people actually building things.

Mixer / networking

A 3-5 mile run at conversational pace with biotech and health tech builders, operators, and investors across the San Francisco ecosystem. Coffee and light bites at the Ferry Building after if you want to keep the conversation going.

Mixer / networking

A three-mile waterfront run at an easy pace, organized by Unify for GTM folks in town during Tech Week. Bag storage, coffee, and pastries included if you want to linger after.

Talks & panels

Most organizations still can't answer where their AI spending actually delivers value, especially when tools augment rather than replace work. This gets at the real question boards are asking now that the hype has settled.

Mixer / networking

Early morning crowd of builders and investors discussing why consumer feedback is broken and how new marketplaces are fixing it. Low-pressure networking before the chaos of the day kicks in.

Mixer / networking

M13 is organizing a morning volunteering session where engineers pack food bags for people in need, then stick around for brunch together. It's a straightforward way to meet other builders while actually helping the local community.

Mixer / networking

Levelheaded is using AI to get dispute parties to signed agreements faster, cutting through the months and legal fees typical settlements require. Small coffee conversation with the founder, investors, and folks from courts and property management who actually use the system.

Mixer / networking

A mid-week SoulCycle session designed for B2C founders and marketers who need to think clearly. Small group, application-reviewed attendees, and a recovery focus make this worth the sweat equity.

Mixer / networking

Healthtech founders and investors meet for coffee, walking meditation, and pier-side conversation near the Ferry Building. Low-key vibe designed to build real connections in the healthcare startup scene.

Mixer / networking

A casual 5K through SF with founders and the operators backing them, followed by coffee and conversation. Good for meeting people in the fundraising world without the usual pitch-fest energy.

Mixer / networking

A grounded alternative to the typical Tech Week hustle: meditation and coffee with founders, investors, and builders who actually want to talk. No yoga experience necessary, just show up for 90 minutes of breathing, moving, and meeting people when everyone's still human.

Mixer / networking

A bike ride across the Golden Gate Bridge for founders and investors who actually ride, hosted by Elo Health and Kielo Cycling. Post-ride refreshments give you time to talk shop without the startup event awkwardness.

Mixer / networking

Blackbird Ventures, Skip Capital, and Atlassian are gathering Aussie and Kiwi founders before Tech Week chaos hits. Grab coffee with people who get the accent and the grind.

Mixer / networking

Zero Prime and Theory Ventures are hosting a casual matcha gathering in SoMa with founders and researchers building in AI and software. Low-key venue, good drinks, actual conversation happening over tea.

Workshop / hands-on

Lawyers building custom agents to automate their own workflows in a small, hands-on setting with founders from Ping and a practicing attorney. Four hours to prototype something useful without needing technical background or AI experience.

Talks & panels

A conference built for founders and engineers shipping AI products at scale. Learn how teams at OpenAI, Anthropic, and other builders are turning ambitious ideas into reality.

Mixer / networking

Retail and CPG operators, builders, and advisors walking the Embarcadero to talk shop about what's shifting in the industry. No presentations, just waterfront conversation and optional coffee with people thinking through the same operational and tech problems you are.

Mixer / networking

B2B creator marketing still lacks a proven playbook, so this invite-only salon with growth leaders from Gamma, Replit, and ElevenLabs focuses on what's actually working. Twenty marketers will swap strategies on creator selection, budgeting, and measuring ROI across the full spectrum from brand to performance channel.

Mixer / networking

Cartesia's mobile coffee stand lets you order drinks using their Sonic 3.6 voice models while chatting with the team behind some of the fastest, most expressive voice AI in the Bay. Solid coffee and a chance to hear production-grade voice tech in action.

Talks & panels

Mixer / networking

Meet LILA's research team building AI systems that run the scientific method end to end in autonomous labs. This breakfast for women and non-binary people in science and AI includes real conversation time and open space to connect, plus they're hiring.

Mixer / networking

A Presidio morning for pet health enthusiasts and longevity builders, hosted by Stay. Light science talk on what actually extends dog and cat lifespans, then back to petting dogs and drinking coffee.

Talks & panels

Gunderson Dettmer's counsel breaks down what Bay Area investors actually scrutinize: corporate structure, IP ownership, traction, data practices, and AI governance. Getting ahead of these diligence issues means a smoother fundraise and stronger foundation for scaling.

Talks & panels

Foreign founders who've actually done US expansion share what trips people up beyond the obvious stuff like incorporation and hiring. The real lesson: figuring out who your actual customer is before you waste months on the wrong bet.

Talks & panels · Workshop / hands-on

Genspark's hosting a day-long space where you can actually talk to the investors and founders shaping AI right now. Panels on scaling and AI bets, plus build hours and office hours if you want to dig deeper.

Mixer / networking

Vonage and Alumni Ventures are hosting an intimate breakfast for pre-seed to Series A founders to discuss scaling in today's market. Expect direct insights on fundraising, VC priorities, and how infrastructure partnerships accelerate growth, plus intro to Vonage's startup program.

Talks & panels

Fin's CX summit brings together leaders from Anthropic, Clay, Kalshi, and others for conversations on AI's impact on customer experience. Eoghan McCabe and Aaron Levie headline a fireside on leading through AI transformation alongside product and support leaders shipping at scale.

Talks & panels

Hardware builders shipping AI chips, consumer electronics, and defense systems converge on the USS Hornet to swap practical knowledge on manufacturing the world's most complex electronics. Cross-industry insights you won't find anywhere else in the valley.

Mixer / networking

A relaxed walk from Rincon Park to Philz with people actually building AI stuff, plus someone from OpenAI's Global Affairs team. Low-key way to swap workflows and find collaborators while OpenAI covers the coffee.

Mixer / networking

A casual breakfast with AI founder peers and execs from NVIDIA, Uber Eats, and Okta Ventures during SF TechWeek. Solid for making intros and talking through agent development challenges with people actually shipping in this space.

Workshop / hands-on

HR and tech leaders get concrete strategies for keeping teams aligned when priorities shift, AI adoption accelerates, and restructuring hits. Walk out with playbooks for communicating change, retaining talent, and maintaining momentum without the burnout.

Mixer / networking

Insurance claims leaders swapping war stories about the synthetic files slipping past their defenses this year. Small, no-pitch breakfast where the only agenda is figuring out what actually works to catch fakes before they cost you.

Talks & panels

Getting real about turning RSUs into Bay Area real estate with a lender, agent, and tax pro in one room. Practical breakdown of stock timing, tax moves, and the commute math most people skip.

Workshop / hands-on

You'll map your customer beliefs onto a canvas, then check each against actual evidence to expose what you're assuming versus what's true. Bring one segment you're building for and spend ninety minutes getting honest about which customer assumptions are actually backed by data.

Mixer / networking

A casual breakfast meetup for Christian founders and investors building in tech, with no agenda or stage. Just Chick-fil-a and conversations with people navigating startups through faith.

Mixer / networking

A working space during Tech Week with coffee, catered lunch, and actual founders who aren't there for networking theater. Grab a desk, get stuff done, and talk to people who build things.

Mixer / networking

A low-key spot to cowork and grab free food during Tech Week while the OpenRouter team runs office hours on models and routing. Drop in for coffee, ask questions about what you're building, and maybe win credits in the raffle.

Mixer / networking

Renegade Partners and a16z are hosting investors who back frontier tech for off-the-record deal flow and due diligence conversations. This breakfast is relationship-building for people who get that transformative companies need both vision and patience.

Workshop / hands-on

Build a Claude agent connected to live web data using Apify and Workato in three hands-on hours with the teams walking the room. You'll ship a working agent that pulls real information and acts on it, then demo what you built.

Talks & panels

A one-day summit on AI agents directing value through payments, markets, and financial infrastructure. Covers stablecoins, wallets, tokenization, compliance, and frontier research with builders and institutions shaping agentic finance.

Mixer / networking

Databricks is hosting Omnigent contributors and partners on a rooftop for breakfast and off-the-grid food during SF Tech Week. Solid morning networking if you're building in the Omnigent ecosystem.

Talks & panels

Gap's CTO hosts conversations with Apple's creative director, Rocket's CMO, and founders exploring how technology and AI reshape discovery and connection. A rare glimpse at how established companies think about reinvention from leaders who've actually done it.

Mixer / networking

B2B founders, GTM leaders, and investors golfing nine holes with zero pitch decks or badge scans, just actual conversations over lunch on the terrace. A refreshing break from the conference circuit where deals actually happen on the green.

Talks & panels

Carta's CFO breaks down where AI actually moves the needle in finance and ops, plus how teams scale from pilots to production workflows. A grounded look at how AI is reshaping what CFOs actually do day-to-day.

Talks & panels

Over a thousand product leaders and executives gathered to explore how AI is reshaping enterprise strategy and execution. If you're building products at scale, this was where the SF tech community exchanged practical patterns for shipping AI-driven features.

Talks & panels · Workshop / hands-on

Heavy-hitting day of panels and workshops covering AI infrastructure, open source models, ops in the US market, and the specifics of scaling from Israel. Lineup spans Google DeepMind, Anthropic, Cognition, Palantir, and the investor class, running 9 AM to 4:30 PM with networking baked in.

Mixer / networking

Trustbridge and Vulcury are hosting a small-group breakfast for early-stage investors during SF Tech Week, covering their manufacturing AI platform and the studio's broader thesis. This is the format that works: real conversation, limited seats, and a chance to see what's actually being built before the pitch deck moment.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A full day connecting Argentine founders, investors, and builders in Silicon Valley with talks on fundraising, US go-to-market, biotech, and AI infrastructure. Focused on sparking the conversations that turn into rounds, hires, and partnerships.

Talks & panels

Four practitioners walk through what early-stage founders should handle themselves versus outsource, covering PR, technical marketing, and thought leadership. You'll leave knowing which comms moves actually move the needle and when hiring help becomes worth it.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

AI is moving into the physical world and investors are already positioning in robotics, mobility, energy, and advanced hardware. A focused panel with GPs from SOSV, Future Frontier, and Samsung Catalyst if you're either building or deploying capital here.

Mixer / networking

A mid-morning gathering where marketers, founders, and operators talk shop about AI's real impact on brand growth. Team Lewis will preview Orbital, their agent-powered marketing operating system, but the real draw is coffee and conversations with people actively building in this space.

Mixer / networking

Low-key morning gathering during SF Tech Week with founders, operators, and investors over coffee and breakfast. Qapita and AVA Insights are hosting, so conversations will likely touch equity management and cross-border fundraising angles.

Talks & panels

Most consumer AI chases productivity, but these founders are building for play, creativity, and connection instead. A panel on what happens when you optimize for fun rather than efficiency.

Talks & panels · Workshop / hands-on

Heavy-hitting operator day with GPs, founders, and execs from Anthropic, Cognition, Palantir, and the broader AI infrastructure world. Tracks span AI infra, deeptech defense, enterprise AI GTM, and cyber safety from 9 AM to 5 PM with workshops and panels.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Four female-focused investors and a moderator from Sisters Capital VC dig into why the funding gap persists and how women backing women actually closes it. Breakfast networking for founders, angels, VCs, and LPs ready to build real relationships.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Google for Startups and NVIDIA bring founders together to explore how accelerated compute and smart architecture decisions create real competitive advantages. Expect fireside chats on quantum-AI breakthroughs, agentic security, and moat-building, plus direct access to Google engineers in the expert lounge.

Talks & panels

Your security buyer sent back 90 questions on your AI feature. This session breaks down the five deal-killing risks and walks through real authorization examples from founders who've shipped this.

Talks & panels

A practical breakdown of how agents connect to APIs, tools, and data in production, covering MCP, connectors, gateways, and the emerging integration stack. Useful if you're building connected AI applications and want to understand the infrastructure behind tool discovery, authentication, and reliable execution.

Talks & panels

Finance and compliance leaders share how they're balancing innovation with risk as companies scale and modernize. A practical roundtable on managing overlapping initiatives, adapting controls, and building resilience for what comes next.

Mixer / networking

Intimate breakfast forum where 10-12 hardware founders discuss what actually works in sourcing, scaling, and fundraising. Topics are attendee-driven, so you'll get peer learning tailored to real challenges in the hardware ecosystem.

Mixer / networking

SF's hardware funding happens in rooms like this. Short pitches and direct conversations between founders and investors who actually write checks.

Talks & panels · Demo night

BGI Labs is betting that scaling AGI means building interpretable, permissioned systems instead of just bigger models, using a cognitive architecture with two decades behind it. See Codey the humanoid robot and proto-AGI applications live, then network with the team building it.

Hackathon · Demo night

Teams of founders and VCs build and pitch a startup from nothing in 90 minutes, with AI tools allowed and judges picking winners across fundability, unhinged energy, and business model. Fast, absurd, and designed to prove that overthinking kills ideas.

Mixer / networking

AWS Solutions Architects and startup specialists will staff a drop-in booth all day to whiteboard through your architecture, cost, or scaling questions. Fastest way to get expert opinions on service choices and infrastructure dilemmas without scheduling.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Seven Latin American consulates are hosting a bilingual summit connecting LATAM founders, investors, and engineers building AI products with Silicon Valley networks and capital. Panels on regional investment, talent, and product engineering, plus a fireside chat with Replit's CTO.

Talks & panels

Most startup pitches lose investors in the first two minutes because the opportunity story isn't told clearly, not because the business is bad. This session breaks down the four-part structure that actually works, then gives you free AI feedback on your own pitch opening.

Mixer / networking

Private investor brunch during SF Tech Week, pulling together VCs, angels, family offices, and LPs for the kind of conversation that usually happens in ones and twos. If you're in the funding world and have an invite, this is the rare room where you can actually network with your whole ecosystem at once.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders rejected by accelerators swap war stories and hear from investors on alternative funding paths. Three speakers share how to keep building when the traditional route says no.

Mixer / networking · Talks & panels

Demo night · Talks & panels

UK founders showing billion-dollar exits and rising stars across AI, semiconductors, and deep tech. Direct access to teams at Matillion, Cambridge GaN Devices, and Quantum Solutions demonstrating how they're scaling real-world solutions.

Hackathon · Demo night

A hackathon on a moving train from NYC to SF where teams build companies, arriving in the Bay for a live demo day with top investors. Unprecedented setting for ambitious builders and scaling founders to connect and pitch.

Talks & panels

Soft Agents is showing how they embed organizational psychology directly into AI agents for talent evaluation and scaling. A rare technical breakdown from founders with deep expertise in both recruitment and AI engineering.

Workshop / hands-on

AWS Solutions Architects help you build agentic AI prototypes all day using Bedrock and AgentCore, dropping in code patterns and architecture guidance as you work. Show up with a use case, AWS credentials, and a laptop to leave with something running.

Workshop / hands-on

The Crunchbase team walks you through their platform to build a targeted investor list matched to your stage and goals. Forty-five minutes of hands-on work beats weeks of random outreach.

Demo night

Surge is demoing SuriLearn and SuriSims, tools for building branded training courses and practice simulations with AI coaching. You'll run a live sim on your phone and get a one-on-one walkthrough if you stick around.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Cross-border payments are fragmented across local rails, FX, and settlement layers, but infrastructure builders and fintech founders are rethinking this. Zennopay's gathering explores how stablecoins, digital wallets, and traditional rails converge to make global money movement faster and truly accessible.

Workshop / hands-on

Intelligence alone won't cut it in legal, finance, or healthcare. Nugen's lab goes beyond fine-tuning to show how architecture-level domain alignment makes models production-ready where mostly right fails.

Hackathon · Demo night

A day building games where voice agents actually converse: AI werewolf tables, arguable NPCs, tutors that listen. Show up solo or with a team and see what ships by 5pm demos.

Hackathon · Demo night

Two days to take an AI idea from concept to pitch, building with Vlight AI alongside founders, designers, and technologists. No CAD skills required; focus on what's worth making in the physical world, meet the hardware ecosystem, and potentially unlock mentorship and manufacturing connections.

Workshop / hands-on

What works at seed becomes a liability at Series B. This hands-on workshop helps scaling leaders identify where their strengths are creating friction and what adapting their approach actually looks like.

Mixer / networking

A brunch for founders navigating US immigration during Tech Week, with lawyers from Extraordinary who've worked both sides of the government and actually understand what changed this year. Sixty spots to network with others figuring out O-1, EB-1A, and green card paths without the legal consultation theater.

Talks & panels

Genspark's co-founder joins AI founders who grew fast to reveal the specific bets that worked: product choices, early spending decisions, and customer moments that shifted trajectory. This is the growth playbook for anyone hunting product-market fit or building a category.

Hackathon

A one-day sprint to build a complete AI-native startup from idea to pitch. You'll validate problems, ship an MVP, and assemble AI teammates using Kylon to accelerate your launch.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Early-stage AI founders pitch to senior engineers and infrastructure builders over dim sum at a classic SF spot, getting real feedback on whether their ideas survive the next model cycle. Winners walk away with prizes and sharper sense of what actually ships.

Talks & panels

Personal brand compounds when it's rooted in a clear point of view that attracts genuine believers. This panel covers how founders and leaders translate expertise into communities where advocacy rivals transactions.

Mixer / networking

A quiet refuge during SF Tech Week's chaos with chair massages, coffee, and actual Wi-Fi to get work done. Drop in anytime between 11am and 2pm if you need to reset between panels without the networking performance.

Workshop / hands-on

This workshop moves past agentic AI theory with a structured lab on Amazon Bedrock, covering architectures, tool use, and deployment in two hours. Useful if you're building AI-native products and need the mental models plus hands-on experience before committing engineering time.

Workshop / hands-on

A hands-on 5-hour workshop to build an AI product or automate a workflow from strategy through launch, guided by founders who've shipped at scale. Work through four gates at your own pace and leave with something real deployed and measurable.

Workshop / hands-on

Founders tired of manual prospecting can build an AI-powered outbound system from scratch and leave with 100 qualified leads. The catch: you've got an hour, and it actually works because Claude handles the research and Apollo runs the campaigns.

Mixer / networking

Clerk's bringing actual cookies and the Auth Van to a drop-in networking session for founders and engineers. Low-pressure way to meet people in the neighborhood and grab some swag.

Mixer / networking

A midweek founders lunch timed for SF Tech Week where you'll refuel with real connections over good food. Exactly what you need when energy dips and the startup grind intensifies.

Mixer / networking

A morning connecting women founders and investors building AI companies, organized around small group discussions led by VCs and LPs. Useful if you're fundraising in AI or want to meet the people backing the next wave of female-founded startups.

Workshop / hands-on · Talks & panels

Investors see dozens of similar AI pitches weekly, so storytelling and positioning matter more than ever. This working session with a presentation coach covers going beyond your deck, followed by direct time in investor breakout rooms.

Talks & panels

Physical AI demos look great until they hit real terrain, bad connectivity, and messy sensor data. This panel with robotics and ag tech builders covers hardware design, data strategies, and closing the loop between lab and field deployment at scale.

Workshop / hands-on · Talks & panels

Founders scaling early-stage AI companies get practical GTM playbooks and strategies for blending digital marketing automation with physical brand presence. A chance to workshop go-to-market challenges with peers and marketers who've done this before.

Mixer / networking

Small-group brunch with eCommerce founders and investors actively deploying capital in consumer brands. Short panels and casual conversation designed to surface real partnership and funding opportunities.

Workshop / hands-on

This workshop covers adaL as part of SF Tech Week's broader ecosystem push. If you're building with adaptive learning systems or curious how they fit into modern AI stacks, this is the practical venue to explore it.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

This convenes researchers, founders, and investors from Stanford and the Boston ecosystem to debate where frontier AI and emerging tech companies actually get built. Worth attending if you're curious how university breakthroughs become real companies and how capital flows differently across coasts.

Workshop / hands-on · Mixer / networking

Grab free coffee and build an AI-powered GTM team using GenTeam, where agents handle the work while you focus on strategy. Bring a real challenge, get free credits, and score an all-day Spark House pass with food and workspace included.

Mixer / networking

A breather from Tech Week's relentless pace with actual food trucks and the Rootly team outdoors. Perfect if you need recharge time between sessions or just want to eat lunch without another pitch.

Talks & panels

Membership organizations have the pieces of thriving networks but scattered them across events and email. This intimate lunch explores how trusted operators turn existing relationships into working digital exchanges.

Mixer / networking

A midweek reset during Tech Week where you'll meet executive women across SF and discover local women-owned businesses. Lunch, low pressure conversation, and actual time away from screens.

Talks & panels

Tom Eggemeier and Deon Nicholas dig into building companies that matter beyond the hype cycle, covering product-market fit, scaling, and navigating acquisitions with live Q&A. Practical wisdom from founders who've actually done it.

Mixer / networking

Airwallex is flying a small group of builders over the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz for afternoon conversations with founders and operators. The views are just the excuse to connect with people actually shipping things in SF.

Hackathon · Demo night

Three hours to build a voice agent using Conductor, the tool Cresta's own engineers use to ship production systems. Watch teams get stress-tested by judges calling in live, then compete for ten grand in Claude credits.

Talks & panels

A Tesla and NVIDIA engineer breaks down the real engineering behind autonomous eVTOLs, from enclosed-rotor hardware solving noise and safety to the regulatory and battery bottlenecks actually blocking urban air mobility. Candid dive into what it takes to go from prototype to daily autonomous air taxis.

Mixer / networking

Talks & panels

Three panels with founders and investors on AI in manufacturing, simulation, and construction. This is the practical breakdown of what it takes to move industrial AI from prototype to scaled deployment.

Hackathon

Teams build escape room puzzles with AI agents working alongside them at speed. It's a rare hackathon that forces you to actually experience what shipping with agents feels like under competitive pressure.

Hackathon

Build the most creative workflow solution on the TradesQuest API with fully AI-generated code, then walk away with Microsoft AI certifications and maybe a $100K investment meeting. This is where agentic orchestration stops being a skill employers want and becomes your credential.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

The panel explores how AI shifts from individual tool to team asset, with Gopal, swyx, and Messina discussing shared context and workflows that scale experiments across groups. Practical lunch conversation on what changes when AI becomes collaborative infrastructure rather than solo productivity software.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Forty hand-picked Swedish startups meet US investors across the full spectrum, from angels to mega-funds. Rapid-fire talks on cross-border scaling and venture trends precede the mixing, making this the essential room for Nordic-US deal flow.

Mixer / networking

Tech Week's best antidote: a sunset picnic for founders and remote builders actually tired of windowless ballrooms. Real conversations, borderless networks, and a membership gateway for people building across borders.

Mixer / networking

Luminar Ventures and Business Sweden are hosting a curated lunch for Nordic and Silicon Valley founders, investors, and angels focused on AI and deep tech. Small group, high signal, actual deal flow rather than panel theater.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Curated matchmaking brings founders, investors, and operators into conversations designed to connect. A pitch competition and structured 1:1 hour make this worth the afternoon if you're actively building or allocating capital.

Workshop / hands-on · Demo night

Spend an afternoon building a personal AI prototype with coding agents, then watch founders and investors dissect what separates a working demo from a product people actually use. Two-hour sprint plus a panel on turning your prototype into something worth coming back to.

Mixer / networking

Giano's Alberto Chalon and Andreas Wiele are hosting a small lunch for GPs building funds, with both having scaled real companies before moving into late-stage secondaries. This is for fund managers serious about understanding what it takes to get to single-asset deals in companies like Revolut and Synthesia.

Mixer / networking

Founders and operators swapping strategies on inheriting go-to-market without a marketing playbook. Intimate setting means real talk about positioning, hiring, and fixing what doesn't work.

Mixer / networking

Bryel is convening founders betting on proprietary models over API wrappers, exploring when custom training beats frontier models on specific tasks. Candid lunch conversation about the economics and technical tradeoffs of building your own intelligence stack.

Talks & panels

a16z's family office platform for founders and operators shares wealth structuring strategies you'd normally only hear in private advisory sessions. Michel Del Buono, Brad Dillon, and Mindy Isenstein discuss protecting and growing wealth at scale.

Workshop / hands-on

Build a promotional video and landing page from scratch using VideoClaw and Readdy, then see how to automate the whole workflow with AgencyOS. A practical masterclass in shipping a complete marketing campaign in one session.

Talks & panels

Three of Silicon Valley's most active immigrant-founder VCs are pitching their theses and backing founders who built the valley's most iconic companies. Two-minute pitches with direct feedback from GPs at Unshackled, One Way, and Geek Ventures.

Mixer / networking

A low-key breather during SF Tech Week with YC founders and international builders at Alamo Square Park. Hosted by Shor, a YC S25 payroll platform, so you'll actually meet the people solving problems for founders building across borders.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Finance leaders are grappling with what to automate versus what requires human judgment as AI handles more of the workflow. This small roundtable with CFOs and founders cuts through the hype to discuss what actually changes about the modern finance function.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Google and NVIDIA are hosting a full-day builder experience with tactical talks on AI scaling, unit economics, and modular infrastructure from founders and engineers actually shipping at scale. Expert lounge access lets you stress-test your architecture directly with Google's startup resources.

Mixer / networking

Tech Week's relentless pace makes it easy to lose sight of what you're actually building toward. This gathering uses ikigai to slow down and explore the intersection of purpose, skill, and impact through honest conversation and guided reflection.

Talks & panels · Demo night

OpenMV and CPTI are demonstrating what happens when hardware builders can leverage instead of reinvent, with live prototypes and a panel on deciding what to build yourself. Stick around after to get feedback on your own hardware challenges from founders actually shipping these building blocks.

Mixer / networking

Two investors hosting a lunch for the Bay Area AI and tech funding community. A few hours of unstructured conversation over food with people actively backing the next wave of companies.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Builders spend 40+ hours slouched at desks while their bodies accumulate damage that sleep tracking misses entirely. This isn't yoga, it's a movement baseline assessment plus a protocol designed for desk life, led by founders fixing the missing pillar of longevity.

Talks & panels · Research & papers

Researchers tackling formal proof systems for AI agents, where neurosymbolic methods let agents verify claims to each other rather than just assert them. Heavy technical focus with presentations on zero-knowledge attestation, runtime enforcement, and decentralized agent coordination.

Mixer / networking

A casual afternoon with Mercury and Supabase folks set against some of the city's best views. Good for meeting people in the AI infrastructure space without the usual pitch-deck energy.

Talks & panels

Sit with 300%+ quota hitters and a16z's GTM talent leader to understand what separates exceptional sellers from good ones. Honest conversation about the instincts and operating principles behind outsized performance, moderated by David Belden.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders and comedians share a stage at SF TechWeek, with performers like Priya Shekar and Ilana Arbisser (who works on AI safety at Google) delivering wit to frontier tech builders. Signal's proof-forward format gets the humor treatment in a room built for engagement and actual laughs.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

First security hires and practitioners share what actually works across code scanning, production setup, identity management, and audit prep. Useful if you're figuring out which security decisions matter now versus later, and which tools are worth the cost.

Talks & panels

Bootstrapping forces radically different tradeoffs around hiring, pricing, and growth speed that most founder advice ignores. Alenka Kyslik shares what actually works when outside capital isn't an option.

Mixer / networking

A no-gi jiu jitsu open mat for investors and entrepreneurs with grappling experience. Two hours on the mat with people actually building things instead of the usual conference circuit.

Talks & panels

MCP standardizes how agents connect to APIs, applications, and data sources instead of forcing custom integrations for each system. This SF TechWeek session covers tool discovery, authentication, and production considerations for teams building connective infrastructure.

Talks & panels

Most AI founder content blends into the noise, but this session covers how to build a memorable brand on LinkedIn without budget. You'll get concrete tactics for standing out, building in public, and actual campaign examples from companies doing it right.

Talks & panels

Leaders from ElevenLabs, LangChain, Replit and others share how AI companies actually expand globally, covering go-to-market shifts, team placement strategy, and when to move into new markets. Practical for founders managing international growth at Series A and beyond.

Mixer / networking

Bring your messiest bookkeeping questions to this casual coffee hour with CPAs and the Vecty team, and one lucky startup walks away with five grand in free accounting software. No pitch, just honest help with taxes and compliance over croissants.

Mixer / networking

Orbital Beam's mixer brings founders, operators, enterprise buyers, and VCs together during SF Tech Week. A straightforward room to build connections across the full stack of who's actually shipping and funding AI.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

LILA's research team shows how AI systems run the full scientific method in autonomous labs across protein design, chemistry, and materials science. Unhurried conversation with plenty of time to actually talk to people, plus they're hiring.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Women in Machine Learning brings their community to COLM for lunch, a panel on humanity in the AI era, and mentorship roundtables with researchers and practitioners. Solid space to figure out research directions, navigate career moves, or just meet your people in the field.

Talks & panels

GTM experts and unicorn founders sharing what actually works for AI-era software startups at an all-day summit. If your go-to-market strategy needs fixing, this is the practical place to figure it out.

Demo night

Taiwan's premier startup acceleration program brings its most promising cohort to Silicon Valley for demo day, backed officially by Taiwan's government startup administration. See breakthrough tech and scalable models pitched to VCs and corporate innovation teams during SF Tech Week.

Talks & panels

StreamGres brings query subscriptions to Postgres, sending only changed rows in real-time instead of full results. The team behind it walks through the architecture and production deployment powering real-time collaboration at Xyne.

Workshop / hands-on

Get specific, live feedback on your product design from Ondrej and a room of people who came to learn, not be polite. Ten presenters get five minutes to show their work and three minutes of unfiltered critique that'll sharpen your next iteration.

Workshop / hands-on

Companies hiring for AI roles now need critical thinkers and clear communicators as much as they need coders, making BA degrees surprisingly valuable in tech. This workshop cuts through the confusion about what non-technical paths actually exist and how to position yourself for them.

Hackathon

Build an AI agent that actually understands your company's knowledge across Slack, GitHub, Notion, and other tools while respecting who can access what. This hackathon pushes past single-app demos to create a Company Brain that remembers context and coordinates work across your entire stack.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

You can quote your startup's burn rate to the dollar, but do you know your own? This clinic cuts through SF's cost-of-living math with real speakers and open discussion on income, rent, and actual numbers.

Talks & panels

Silicon Data and Compute Exchange bring clearing-price data and real marketplace bids to a panel on how compute and tokens are actually priced. If you're building at scale, understanding what you're actually paying matters.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A panel of active fractionals and advisors sharing concrete strategies on pricing, finding clients, and building sustainable solo businesses. Worth it for the specifics on standing out in an increasingly crowded market, plus networking with people actually doing this.

Mixer / networking

This invite-only SFTechWeek gathering connects VCs and founders across the Bay Area tech scene. A solid networking play if you're looking to meet people actually building in the region.

Workshop / hands-on

Learn how to write press releases that actually reach journalists, from PR pros and a CNBC reporter who know what works. You'll walk out with a company boilerplate and finished release ready to pitch your story.

Workshop / hands-on

Rauhmel Fox walks through the actual incorporation docs from OpenAI Foundation, Open Research Lab, and Signal Technology Foundation to show you how to structure your own nonprofit. Covers Delaware filing, 501(c)(3) setup, and getting developer program waivers so you can focus on building instead of bureaucracy.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Finance leaders from Figma, Chime, and Once Upon a Farm discuss transformation approaches and AI's growing role in the function. A curated panel followed by wine tasting and networking in a private gallery space.

Workshop / hands-on

A small working session where founders actually debug real customer discovery problems together, not pitch or network generically. Distribution is the hard part now, and this room trades patterns on earning attention and building repeatable channels.

Hackathon

Build an agent that replaces a workflow you actually hate, ship it in two hours, and win $10K plus Vegas. Organizers are looking for agents solving real problems that people or other agents would pay for.

Hackathon · Demo night

A working hackathon where you arrive solo or idea-less, find collaborators to fill your gaps, and leave with something demoable. The Nordic-Bay Area crossover during SF Tech Week's Swedish House attracts builders worth staying connected with after the event ends.

Talks & panels

Physical AI is moving from software into real infrastructure like data centers, airports, and power plants with AI-powered video analytics and edge intelligence. This session covers practical deployments, existing infrastructure modernization, and collaboration opportunities across the critical infrastructure ecosystem.

Mixer / networking

A walking conversation with female founders and funders through Salesforce Park, no pitches or name tags required. This is the kind of low-pressure networking where actual connection happens while discussing what it takes to build and back bold ideas.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Consumer AI has the interface but still can't act, book tables, buy tickets, or get through doors. This afternoon brings agent companies, travel platforms, hospitality tech, and payments infrastructure into one room to solve what breaks in production.

Talks & panels

Twenty thousand emails, two replies, zero targeting. This masterclass shows what went wrong and the hybrid approval system with logging that actually works, plus how to predict which emails go unread.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Niantic Spatial and RLWRLD are demoing embodied AI with live robot manipulation and spatial understanding, no presentations required. Drinks and high-signal conversations with teams shipping perception-to-action systems during SF Tech Week.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Twenty of SF's fastest-growing AI startups pitch to 200+ builders shipping at the frontier, followed by breakout rooms and 1:1s where your next hire or career move might happen. Mercor, Cresta, Retell AI, and others competing for top talent in a single afternoon.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Real operators bring actual business problems to Microsoft data scientists for live problem-solving on process inefficiencies, knowledge management, and cross-functional coordination. Watch experienced Chiefs of Staff get concrete frameworks and AI approaches from the people shipping these systems.

Talks & panels · Demo night

GTM engineering leaders and startup founders converge in Union Square to debate how AI reshapes go-to-market strategy. Curated talks, founder demos, and small-room networking with people actually shipping modern GTM systems.

Talks & panels

Founders who've cracked US sales share what actually works at each growth stage, then real enterprise buyers pressure-test your pitch and explain why they'd pass. Brutally practical feedback designed to sharpen your positioning before you hit the market.

Talks & panels

Three leading US VCs on where they're finding conviction in AI, hardware, and frontier tech across the US, UK, and Europe. Closed-door panel with Peter Barrett, Jason Pontin, and Heather Redman, followed by UK founder pitches and the British Tech Street Festival.

Workshop / hands-on

Hands-on lab where you'll build AI agents on HubSpot's platform alongside other builders, tackling real challenges like CRM data enhancement, debugging, asset generation, or autonomous maintenance. Small group format keeps things collaborative and unblocks you faster than working alone.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A curated afternoon for LPs, family offices, and exited founders to talk real deployment strategy in AI and deep tech without the pitch. Direct intros, candid panels on manager selection and founder-to-allocator transitions, done by 6pm so you make dinner.

Demo night

Anna Shimafuji's bringing her brain fatigue measurement system and ZEN VR recovery program from Kyoto, letting you test both in minutes. Worth trying if you're curious how neural measurement meets immersive recovery, plus there's matcha.

Talks & panels

CFOs from Coursera, ClickUp, Deel, and Carta discuss how AI and finance execution converge to build resilient, scaled companies. This is practical governance thinking from leaders already navigating the messy reality of modern finance ops.

Mixer / networking

A rare chance to get founders, investors, and operators on hydrofoils during SF Tech Week, with pro equipment on hand and casual conversations about building and AI. Best ideas happen where the signal's actually low.

Talks & panels

Founders with massive audiences share how they converted attention into startups and communities. Learn the playbook for building in public from creators who've already scaled millions.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Designers of capital structures for hardware and deeptech will hash out where sovereign, strategic, and venture money actually align. Niko Woischnik, Steve Jacobs, and Victoria Slivkoff break down the incentive gaps, followed by roundtables on breakout early-stage returns and global positioning.

Talks & panels

Most AI founder pitches blur together because they're all deck slides and product claims. This session cuts through that by treating your pitch as narrative, with speakers from Fenwick, Authentic Communications, and two venture firms showing how differentiation actually happens.

Demo night

Entrepreneurs First's demo day brings together their most ambitious early-stage founders from Europe, India, and the US who've built from scratch. Worth watching if you want to see what's getting traction across their global cohorts and spot patterns in what's working right now.

Mixer / networking

Base10 and Stripe are hosting a networking afternoon for founders and early employees across pre-seed through Series B. Light refreshments and conversations with investors and peers who actually understand early stage dynamics.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

AI is reshaping marketplaces faster than most founders realize, simultaneously solving their core problems and creating new ones like fake supply and gamed trust. Hear from marketplace CEOs on where the next category emerges and how to survive the shift.

Mixer / networking

AI is shifting how clinical trials operate, and this happy hour cuts through the hype with people actually running studies. Bring one question you're wrestling with, leave with practical criteria for choosing CROs, sites, and AI tools that work today.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Companies pitch to you instead of the other way around: 15 actual startups get three minutes to convince you they're worth your time. You judge them, ask hard questions, and leave if the pitch is mid.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

General Counsel and legal ops leaders discuss actual buying processes for LegalTech with executives from Collective Health, DoorDash, Securonix, and Lyft. Panel covers vendor selection, security procurement, and building lasting partnerships, followed by a mixer.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Chinese AI models are reshaping global tech influence through open, affordable alternatives to American platforms, raising questions about competitive advantage and geopolitical power. This panel examines whether China achieves AI leadership by 2030 and whether collaboration across borders remains possible.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders and operators from Smartlead, Pump, and Chatbase discuss the mechanics of scaling sales and support without hiring linearly. A candid roundtable on automation priorities, human-powered workflows, and where fast-growing startups typically stumble.

Talks & panels

AI agents are now doing the work candidates and hiring teams rely on, creating a trust crisis where bots screen bots and cheating detection flags a third of interviews. This debate explores what hiring actually looks like when agents are real team members and everyone's augmented.

Mixer / networking

A midweek walk for early-stage builders to reset, meet thoughtful founders, and share what you're working on and what you need help with. Low-pressure conversation and mutual support beats another networking happy hour.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Hiring is already broken: candidates use AI to auto-apply and whisper answers during interviews while companies use AI to screen and reject them. A panel of founders and operators gets honest about what trust looks like when bots interview bots, and how to actually build teams in this mess.

Mixer / networking

A boat full of builders with one eye on SF and one on Tokyo, catching the sunset and comparing notes on what's happening across the Pacific. Low-key vibes: drinks, good people, and maybe a small experiment or two.

Mixer / networking

Heidi, an AI care platform built by clinicians, is popping up in SoMa during Tech Week to meet builders and swap what everyone's working on. Grab gelato, chat with their technical and talent teams, and enter a raffle for a prize of your choice.

Mixer / networking

Casual networking event with Oracle Cloud team and other builders, good if you want to talk infrastructure over drinks without the pitch. Light enough to actually be enjoyable, practical enough if you're thinking about cloud compute for your AI work.

Workshop / hands-on · Mixer / networking

A hands-on Capture The Flag night where you exploit real AI vulnerabilities in a live environment, then learn how to defend against them. No lectures, just three escalating challenges, a competitive scoreboard, and drinks after you figure out where GenAI actually breaks.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders and early investors break down the messy reality of commercializing physical AI, from enterprise sales to manufacturing at scale. TSVC brings teams shipping robots in agriculture and manufacturing to share what actually works beyond the demo.

Demo night

Physical AI startups tackling mineral exploration, infrastructure inspection, autonomous drones, and grid management are showing what happens when intelligence leaves the software layer. Spatial Capital and Capgemini are bringing founders deploying agents in the real world during SF Tech Week, with live demos and founders in the room.

Talks & panels

A live panel on how AI and tech are reshaping media and storytelling, featuring leaders like Inkitt's CEO and the Times' games chief. The conversation gets recorded for both podcast feeds, so you'll catch it later if you can't make Tech Week.

Talks & panels · Demo night

They're building recursive AI that observes your health patterns, suggests changes, learns from your response, and adapts with human experts in the loop. Live demos show how personal data drives steadier energy and better sleep while building habits that actually stick in demanding lives.

Talks & panels

Early-stage telehealth founders face completely different GTM challenges than scaling ones, and this session breaks down what actually matters at each stage. SuperDerma AI walks you through the full patient funnel and which metrics to optimize when product-market fit turns into a growth engine.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A panel of VCs, lawyers, and operators unpacking the actual Series A process for founders in the thick of it. Real talk on what it takes to navigate fundraising, with time to network and ask the questions keeping you up at night.

Talks & panels

Enterprises are shipping more code with AI, but measuring actual business value remains elusive. This closed-room discussion with CTOs explores where AI creates value versus where it gets lost in translation between engineering output and enterprise outcomes.

Mixer / networking

Wittington and Plug and Play are hosting a small physical AI happy hour for founders, researchers, and investors working across models, hardware, data, and infrastructure. Two firms with serious LP networks in logistics and manufacturing, so this is worth attending if you're shipping robotics or physical systems.

Talks & panels · Workshop / hands-on

RelaXi explores how to design sensory experiences that combat burnout in the age of AI, bringing together founders, designers, researchers, and cultural tastemakers for intimate conversation and hands-on curation. This is for people curious about how emotion, the senses, and intentional design might shape the next generation of wellbeing.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Kirsten Green and Kahlil Lalji discuss how venture capital is pushing founders to take bigger swings in a fireside chat. Reset between talks with sauna, cold plunges, wellness drinks, and live embroidery.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

SE Asian founders and operators converge during SF Tech Week for lightning talks and direct access to unicorn founders, investors, and ecosystem players. RSVP required, limited spots, and the first in a series of exclusive mixers.

Talks & panels

The self-serve playbook doesn't scale to enterprise, and this panel with Adobe, Topaz Labs, and Synthesia breaks down that inflection point. Four product activations plus a new Adobe for Startups offer make it worth the RSVP.

Mixer / networking

As AI agents move from answering questions to taking autonomous actions, identity-based security breaks down fast. This happy hour explores why intent and context are becoming the real perimeters defending your systems.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Media insiders from Yahoo, Vox, LinkedIn, and emerging founders discussing where the industry heads next. Candid conversations and quality networking with people actually shaping what media becomes.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Construction teams are exploring AI and robotics to rethink project delivery, coordination, and field operations at scale. This is a direct conversation with companies already deploying these systems on real datacenter builds.

Talks & panels

Meta's AI is already picking who sees ads and testing creative. Jay Shah maps what disappears next and which marketer skills actually become more valuable as the system takes over more of the work.

Talks & panels

Infrastructure and hardware are becoming the competitive moat for AI, and this session with UK policymakers, Anthropic engineers, and Stanford researchers explores how governments and industry can actually build it. Practical for anyone thinking beyond model weights to the compute, energy, and talent questions that matter.

Mixer / networking

Most enterprises are stuck on the same four problems with AI: governance, cost, ROI, and liability. VizCo is hosting a lunch conversation with people actually grappling with these barriers, no sales pitch required.

Mixer / networking

Roboticists, researchers, and builders exploring embodied AI gathering for casual conversation and scene-building during SF Tech Week. A good chance to find collaborators and understand what's actually happening in the space right now.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Anand Krishna from Inkle and Sudarshan Kamath from Smallest.ai discuss building AI products that actually sell to enterprises, from sub-second latency tradeoffs to where the next wave makes money. Then the room opens up for founders at any stage to network over drinks and food.

Talks & panels

Two sessions on how AI is reshaping Bay Area real estate from both sides: new wealth patterns creating different buyers, and ranking systems deciding which agents they actually contact. Hear from a 25-year broker navigating tech money shifts and a former Tinder CPO who built discovery systems at scale.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Multimodal AI is moving from isolated experiments to integrated systems, and this panel with builders at ElevenLabs, Higgsfield, Runware, and Sierra AI maps where the real opportunities are. Practical for anyone thinking about how voice, video, agents, and infrastructure actually fit together in production.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Investors from top firms discuss where AI capital is flowing and which founders they're backing next. The networking block after gives you direct access to make real connections without the cold email.

Talks & panels

A foundational intro to AI fundamentals and practical tools for anyone starting from scratch. Hear from leading presenters on how AI skills can level up your work, regardless of technical background.

Talks & panels · Demo night

Ease My AI explores how enterprises and critical infrastructure are replacing traditional surveillance with AI-driven video intelligence for security and operations. See live demos of AI analytics deployed at airports, power plants, and industrial facilities.

Mixer / networking

On-device AI cuts latency, cost, and cloud lock-in, and femtoAI's launching their revamped developer portal at this beer garden meetup. Talk to the teams building local-first infrastructure while they're still ahead of the curve.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Finance teams scaling AI need a single source of truth or risk compounding chaos across operations. This fireside chat with high-growth finance leaders covers data architecture, governance, and practical next steps on a FiDi rooftop.

Mixer / networking

An evening hosted by Lowenstein Sandler to celebrate women founders, operators, and investors in the SF tech community during Tech Week. Good for making genuine connections with peers who actually shape the ecosystem.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Hear from legal, finance, and insurance leaders on why most AI pilots fail to scale and what founders need to navigate regulated enterprise sales. Panelists from DLA Piper, Capital One, and Leavitt Group share authentic buyer perspectives on risk, compliance, and real deployment patterns.

Mixer / networking

A fall evening in the Presidio for VC Backed Moms founders to reconnect and meet others navigating motherhood and startups. Casual enough to drop by after work, substantive enough to actually deepen relationships with people building real companies.

Mixer / networking

Retailers and commerce builders exploring how agents are reshaping checkout, search, and customer service. A networking evening worth attending if you're thinking about agentic tools in retail workflows.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Replit, Gamma, and ElevenLabs marketing leads break down what actually gets brand deals done, with tech creator Katherine Gilligan and networking with people actually hunting collaborations. Useful if you're trying to figure out how creators and brands connect in the AI era.

Talks & panels

Portugal's engineering talent costs significantly less than the Bay Area with R&D tax incentives and a European foothold already built. Investors, operators, and government advisors break down whether it actually works for U.S. startups expanding internationally.

Workshop / hands-on · Hackathon

Build a voice agent from scratch and install it inside a vintage Furby you'll take home, learning real-time speech streaming and hardware integration along the way. No hacking experience needed, just bring your laptop and Python or Node.js installed.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Fifteen AI founders get two minutes each to demo live products while VCs provide real feedback, no pitch deck required. It's scrappy and high-energy, designed for early-stage teams actually building something worth showing off.

Mixer / networking

Finding a cofounder requires chemistry and shared values, not a résumé screening, and this small IRL gathering lets you observe how people actually think and decide through games and real conversation. Built for founders actively searching and builders serious about committing to someone else's vision.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Teams shipping AI at scale are sharing what actually breaks and how they fixed it. Worth attending if you're wrestling with training infrastructure, cost management, or deployment decisions in production.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Critical minerals are the real constraint on AI infrastructure and energy systems, not compute. Three panels with founders and investors on extraction, processing, and the unglamorous work of turning mining tech into bankable companies.

Talks & panels

A panel exploring how AI mediates human connection, from relationship tools that help you remember people to systems that might hollow out authentic interaction. Founders and a policy expert discuss when AI genuinely strengthens community versus when it makes human contact feel transactional.

Talks & panels

Top tech reporters break down how they filter signal from noise in AI, semiconductors, and infrastructure to find stories their readers actually care about. Useful for founders who want to understand what makes journalists tick and how to think about your own narrative in a crowded market.

Talks & panels

Lukas Biewald and Vaidy Raghavan discuss where hardware manufacturing meets AI at scale, covering robotics, aerospace, and consumer devices. Limited seats with actual builders and scaler engineers who are shipping physical products today.

Talks & panels

AI-native startups are shipping faster but building fragility, skipping the GTM fundamentals that enable sustainable scaling. This session maps the paradox and shows what a repeatable go-to-market operating system actually requires.

Mixer / networking

This mixer brings together West Coast and Southwest investors, founders, and tech leaders to explore emerging AI investment corridors and Arizona's growing role in scaling companies. High-value networking with a focus on growth-stage innovation and cross-ecosystem collaboration.

Talks & panels

Two experienced CEOs and their coaches discuss what actually gets solved in the room versus what requires hard work elsewhere. The conversation spans real challenges, AI's role in advisory, and patterns that emerge whether you're bootstrapping or scaling.

Mixer / networking

A casual hangout with roboticists building real systems. Shows up during SFTechWeek if you want to understand how robotics teams approach models, hardware, and data.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A panel on the harder questions around AI-mediated connection: when does it help maintain relationships and build community, and when does it make human interaction feel transactional? Featuring builders working on relationship tools, AI transparency, and community matching.

Talks & panels

GrupaAI is sharing tactics from founders who've hit real revenue numbers before demoday. Practical if you're trying to prove unit economics matter more than hype.

Hackathon · Mixer / networking

Senior leaders bring real problems to pressure-test with Propeller consultants and peers in a hybrid hackathon and speed-networking format. Come with the challenge keeping you up at night, leave with actionable ideas and connections with people solving similar problems.

Mixer / networking · Demo night

Meet founders and investors exploring preventive health tech while competing for one of five free HealMint Smart Rings. The ring tracks biometrics and delivers personalized wellness insights, priced at half the cost of comparable wearables.

Mixer / networking

Most AI conversation centers on frontier models, but real value flows through applications built further back by people who never train anything. Fifty Black researchers, builders, operators, and investors gather to discuss where money actually moves, what insiders see before it trends, and concrete startup ideas sitting in plain sight.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

CodeRabbit and dev-tooling builders are cutting through the noise with short, opinionated talks on what's actually working in agentic development: code review, open source, software factories, and real risks. Come argue with the founders and engineers shipping this stuff, not attend another product pitch.

Mixer / networking

An intimate roundtable with founders and executives working through what leadership looks like when humans and agents work together. The conversation covers accountability, team design, and trust in this shifting dynamic.

Mixer / networking

A casual evening mixing Oktoberfest vibes with SF tech networking, hosted by the German American Chamber of Commerce and German consulate. If you've got German business ties or just want to meet founders while drinking proper beer, this hits both marks.

Workshop / hands-on · Demo night

You pitch your app idea in 15 minutes, then close your laptop while Morph builds it autonomously for an hour. It's the fastest way to see if your half-baked concept actually works in practice.

Mixer / networking

LatAm fintech founders, investors, and operators from Pygma, Finix, Ontop, and others gather for SF Tech Week drinks. Payments, lending, neobanks, remittances: whatever you're building, this is where the community moves deals and partnerships forward.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

People building and deploying AI in enterprise settings share what actually breaks in the field and how that shapes products. Candid talk on trust, governance, and when custom work becomes platform, with rare cross-functional perspective.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

The identity layer wasn't built for software acting on your behalf, and agents are already taking credentials and payment methods. A candid panel on what breaks when agents get access, who's accountable, and what actually works.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Three candid panels on AI safety, capital flows, and defense tech with 300+ researchers, founders, and investors. Rooftop networking with sunset views and a DJ set afterward makes this the rare event where substance and scene actually align.

Mixer / networking

Defense tech is genuinely gaining momentum right now, and this is a rare chance to meet the founders and national security leaders actually making it happen. No panels or posturing, just conversations about how AI and autonomy move from labs to real capability.

Mixer / networking

One-person companies are becoming viable at serious scale, and this is where solo builders in SF compare notes on AI workflows that actually work. Expect honest talk about tools, challenges, and real connections with people shipping solo in the AI era.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Renegade comedians roast SF founders and their runaway AI bills on stage during Tech Week, with special segments exposing token criminals and VIP meet-and-greats. A room packed with YC founders, technical operators, and VCs watching their own companies get skewered.

Mixer / networking

Small rooftop gathering where founders and investors actually talk instead of perform, with a firepit and Bay views. The 60-second intros are optional, which tells you everything about the vibe here.

Talks & panels · Demo night

The panel explores what happens when autonomous AI makes decisions that shape work, society, and the economy, with voices from Meta, Cognizant, and leading AI labs. You'll see live demos of agents interacting in shared environments to understand how they actually behave when left to their own choices.

Mixer / networking

Swenode's curating 30 early-stage Nordic AI founders for Bay Area investors in an intimate garden setting. They've had a track record spotting breakout companies before they blow up, making this a smart move for VCs looking ahead.

Mixer / networking

AI is reshaping legal services across Africa faster than most builders realize, and this gathering brings together the founders and investors actually working in those markets. Worth attending if you're curious about how African legal tech differs from US playbooks and where the real gaps are.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Frontier AI labs, safety researchers, investors, and defense tech operators in one room debating whether safety can keep pace with capability. Three sharp panels followed by rooftop networking at Temple with 300+ builders and allocators.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Candid conversations with founders and investors on scaling companies when the stakes are highest, from Lime's CEO to Menlo Ventures partners. This curated event for ambitious leaders includes a town hall and networking with the people actually navigating late-stage growth.

Mixer / networking

Nordic innovation orgs are hosting rooftop fireside chats with founders, investors, and industry leaders. Sharp networking opportunity if you're looking to connect with Nordic tech players or just want great Bay views with quality people.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

VCs and LPs discussing investment conviction and emerging opportunities during SF Tech Week. A panel on how investors are thinking across different stages, with substantial time to network and reconnect.

Talks & panels

Biotech founders often waste capital building capabilities they could access through CROs, shared labs, and strategic partners instead. This session cuts through the noise on what actually needs to be in-house versus outsourced to hit milestones faster.

Demo night · Talks & panels

A UK-focused festival bringing together founders, investors, and tech leaders from both sides of the Atlantic. You'll see 50+ investment-ready companies demo, including robotics and quantum, plus navigate where US and UK innovation ecosystems actually intersect.

Talks & panels

Circular textiles are becoming a major economic opportunity as brands like Coachtopia and Eileen Fisher prove remake creates real value. Hear from Shamini Dhana and Eileen Mockus on how AI, regulation, and material costs are reshaping fashion's future.

Talks & panels

Keith Peiris shut down Tome at 70 people to rebuild CRM from scratch, and just raised $47M Series A to do it. Hear directly from him on pivoting hard, picking co-founders, and knowing which products deserve a decade of your life.

Workshop / hands-on

Hexa and Amplitude dig into whether AI can close the build-measure-learn loop itself, turning usage data into automated product iteration. Two teams actually operating inside that shift explain what self-improving products look like in practice.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders and builders talking GTM with Salesforce, Fin, and SaaStr on the highest floor in SF, with demos on MCP, customer service agents, and reaching new markets. 360-degree city views and drinks with 150 other operators working through similar problems.

Mixer / networking

A curated happy hour for Seed and Series A founders with early-stage VCs actively investing right now. No panels or pitches, just off-the-record conversations designed to build real connections in the startup ecosystem.

Talks & panels

OpenAI, YC, and A16z leaders discuss where AI creates real business value and how to build defensible companies at scale. Candid conversations on product-market fit, GTM models, and what investors are actually looking for right now.

Demo night · Talks & panels

Nine AI and health founders pitch to investors who've prepped with context beforehand, followed by a guided reset and operator panel on digital health dynamics. Registration requires approval, capping attendance at 90 to keep conversations substantive.

Mixer / networking

HR leaders wrestling with AI point-solution sprawl will find this peer-led roundtable more useful than another panel. Bring a real stack decision and get unfiltered feedback from CPOs and HRIS executives solving the same architecture problems.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Nash runs logistics for millions of orders monthly across messy, decades-old operations, using AI to route every shipment and catch failures before they spiral. Meet engineers who deploy directly into production complexity and are hiring for teams building infrastructure for the physical world.

Mixer / networking

Fo, an AI assistant from Wajo, reads attendee profiles and starts group texts introducing people who should actually meet before the party starts. You show up already knowing who to find, skipping the small talk entirely.

Mixer / networking

Women founders, investors, and finance leaders discussing what's actually shifting in fintech right now: AI, stablecoins, payment rails, and where capital is flowing. Limited capacity and rooftop access during SF Tech Week makes this a focused conversation worth the logistics.

Mixer / networking

Health-tech founders and clinicians swap war stories over drinks while Joji shows how they're actually solving patient problems. Healthcare Bingo with real prizes keeps things loose, making this a rare moment when the chaos of the industry feels manageable.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Industrial AI executives and 50+ VCs converging for keynotes on heavy industry transformation, then Harris spinning until dawn. If you care about where manufacturing meets AI, this is the night.

Mixer / networking

Fo matches you with three or four people worth knowing before you arrive, then steps out of the way. Speed-friending for builders who'd rather skip the small talk and find their people.

Talks & panels

A practical walkthrough of SEO and AEO campaigns powered by agents, from topic research through measuring brand mentions in AI search results. You'll see where agents actually accelerate the work and where human judgment still wins, with a live Arda demo included.

Mixer / networking

Two teams shipping voice agents are gathering on a rooftop to talk production deployments in customer service, healthcare, and contact centers. If you're building in voice AI, the skyline views and small talk with people actually running these systems at scale is worth the climb.

Mixer / networking

Three VCs and Dentons are hosting a rooftop gathering above the Tech Week chaos where founders and investors actually talk instead of perform. No panels, no pitches, just high-altitude networking designed to cut through the noise.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

See what builders are making with Lovable and Atlassian tools at this demo night tied to SF Tech Week. Networking, demos, drinks, and a chance to show your work if you've got something worth shipping.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Healthcare AI is genuinely hard to break into, and this small happy hour brings together founders already shipping in the space with those seriously considering it. Nitesh Shroff and Edward Tiong share what selling to payers and providers actually looks like, plus where early-stage builders tend to miss the mark.

Talks & panels

Capital markets infrastructure is finally moving onchain, and this panel maps the full stack from network layer to tokenized products to real-time payments. Hear from Stable Sea, WisdomTree, and Stellar on how companies are accessing 24/7 liquidity and daily yield on idle cash today.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Mixer / networking

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

The three teams actually shipping voice infrastructure are getting specific about what still breaks: turn detection, diarization, interruptions, the milliseconds that kill naturalness. Skip the marketing talk and grab engineering patterns from teams with real scars in production.

Mixer / networking

The official After Argentina event continues the conversation with food, drinks, and casual padel and pickball matches. A low-key way to actually talk shop with other builders from the day.

Mixer / networking

Meet the people building AI infrastructure at the Power Acceleration Summit kickoff dinner. Fireside chat at 8pm covers the race to power the AI age, with cocktails and networking from 5:30.

Talks & panels

Today's biotech founders can leverage shared labs, CROs, and AI tools instead of building everything in-house, fundamentally changing capital efficiency and speed. This session breaks down what to outsource, when to partner, and how to scale without bloat.

Talks & panels

Mixer / networking

Kyberis is hosting a wine and cheese mixer focused on threat ops as a security foundation for AI systems. Worth attending if you're thinking through how to operationalize safety alongside your agent deployments.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

What does it mean to own intelligence when AI systems learn and adapt themselves? This is a builder-focused evening with five-minute technical takes, an open mic for your strongest opinions or experiments, and a first look at what's next.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Capital concentration is reshaping how LPs build venture exposure, and this unconference explores where differentiated returns hide among emerging managers and established platforms. Expect candid conversation from allocators on direct investing, fund evaluation, and allocation strategies evolving into 2027.

Mixer / networking

A private dinner for founders and engineering leaders wrestling with agent deployment at scale. You'll swap production blueprints on security, reliability, cost optimization, and the unglamorous work of moving beyond prototype.

Talks & panels

Product leaders from Asurion, Upstart, Rime, and Audioshake discuss what it actually takes to ship voice AI products at scale. A rare chance to hear from founders and executives already deep in this rapidly-growing space.

Demo night

Sixteen European founders pitch their AI, HealthTech, and DeepTech startups in three-minute rounds while you vote for winners live. Fast-paced competition with serious deal flow and Austrian wine.

Mixer / networking

Bring your favorite AI agent to happy hour and celebrate the relationships you're building with the tools that know your inbox better than you do. First 50 drinks are free, and if you're flying solo, they'll help you find your AI plus-one.

Mixer / networking

A low-key networking setup with investors and founders during SF Tech Week. Good if you want to have actual conversations without the pitch-deck energy.

Mixer / networking

Dimension's bringing together the bio-ML crowd for an unstructured evening of drinks and conversation, no panels required. If you're building ML infrastructure for scientists or exploring how AI reshapes biotech, this is where the scene is actually congregating.

Mixer / networking

A curated gathering for founders and investors navigating cross-border tech scaling, covering IP protection, fundraising, and market expansion across seven continents. Worth the evening if you're building or backing something global and want to talk shop with peers who've done it.

Mixer / networking

KTH's delegation brings Stockholm's thriving tech ecosystem to SF during Tech Week, connecting founders, investors, and alumni from both coasts. A casual drinks event to explore what's emerging from Sweden's AI and deep tech scene.

Mixer / networking

As AI agents hit production, enterprise spend splinters across models, cloud, infrastructure, and vendors, creating a new governance problem. This dinner explores how enterprises actually buy, govern, and measure AI at scale.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Scatter Lab explores what keeps people returning to AI entertainment: connection, control, surprise, and immersion. Essential for founders and product leaders building consumer AI experiences or understanding why some narratives resonate while others fail.

Talks & panels

Henry Ward discusses what it actually takes to build and scale startups today, pulling from Carta's journey and how AI is fundamentally changing the founder playbook. Moderated conversation worth sitting in on if you're thinking about what comes next in the startup ecosystem.

Mixer / networking

Real founders and developers actually shipping agents in production discuss the unglamorous stuff: reliability, evaluation, human-in-the-loop systems, and the emerging AI development lifecycle. Limited to 20 people for genuine conversation, not theater.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A panel on the open-source tooling beyond models: inference optimization, agent frameworks, and post-training approaches from teams actually shipping them. Practical intelligence on what's becoming table stakes for the next generation of AI products.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Enterprise sales playbooks don't exist yet for AI, so this fireside brings together founders actually figuring it out live to discuss buying committees, AI-native GTM, and earning trust at speed. Small room of 40, capped for real conversation.

Mixer / networking

Tavily and MongoDB are hosting a curated padel tournament at Park Padel during SF Tech Week, mixing casual competition with networking among the startup scene. Grab a coworker, show up, and actually get away from the panel circuit for once.

Talks & panels

Bridgit routed World Cup fans through 100+ independent SF businesses, proving small shops can compete when platforms actually route traffic their way. Founders and Chamber voices break down what worked and what it means for building platforms that empower cities instead of just extracting value.

Mixer / networking · Demo night

An evening on the Bay with women building things in AI, featuring live demos, dinner conversation, and the Fleet Week skyline. Boarding at 5:30 sharp on the San Francisco Spirit, with small group facilitation so you're not flying solo.

Talks & panels

The next supercomputer pairs QPUs, GPUs, and CPUs in one machine, and the software and infrastructure challenges are wide open for builders across the industry. This fireside chat explores where quantum sits in the AI acceleration curve and what opportunities emerge when these systems actually scale.

Mixer / networking

Phase Capital's Frontiers Popup brings together builders across biotech, therapeutics, and digital health for an outdoor happy hour. Free drinks and genuine connections with no pitching required, just people thinking about where life sciences tech is headed.

Mixer / networking

A curated gathering for founders building in atoms, qubits, and base pairs, mixing deep tech talks with researchers from Google and NVIDIA leaders. Capped attendance ensures genuine technical exchange on compute constraints and breakthroughs, backed by open bar and a custom deep house set.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

SF pitches are boring AF, so 18VC and Invisible are putting founders on stage with one constraint: pitch your startup and make the room laugh in three minutes. A literal decibel meter measures the laughs, top three win cash prizes, and open mic slots let you roast whatever you want.

Mixer / networking

A builder-first robotics gathering focused on deployment realities and what actually works in the field right now. Expect unfiltered conversations about failure modes, business viability, and where physical AI is headed, plus early demos from top robotics teams.

Mixer / networking

LawBeta's annual beach gathering draws founders and builders for sunset, bonfires, and live music on the Pacific. If you're looking for a low-pressure way to meet people shipping things, the vibe here is consistently solid.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A panel of founders and leadership execs exploring how AI changes what makes a leader effective when everyone can build. Useful for understanding which skills stay critical and how to actually multiply impact instead of just shipping faster.

Mixer / networking

Neural Concept is hosting an intimate evening with engineers from Airbus, GM, and Williams Racing discussing how AI-first workflows actually balance quality and speed. Limited spots, open bar, and the kind of network-building that happens when you get serious people talking shop.

Mixer / networking

COLM's happy hour pulls together top researchers and builders during Tech Week for casual networking over drinks and snacks. Two hours of mingling, games, and collaboration in one room beats another conference panel.

Mixer / networking

Casual drinks and oysters with the Reflection team before the Context Beyond the Window workshop kicks off. Behrooz Ghorbani and crew will be there if you want to talk scaling and grab some merch.

Talks & panels

Robotics teams are hitting a hard wall that language models never faced: data doesn't scale for free. This session pushes back on borrowed assumptions about scaling laws and asks whether embodied AI needs fundamentally different approaches.

Mixer / networking

A private bowling night bringing together 100+ GTM founders and operators during Sculpt week. High-quality networking with people actually shipping products, plus food and good vibes from 6-10 PM at Mission Bowling Club.

Mixer / networking · Demo night

Watch Miro and n8n teams demo how AI agents stay grounded in actual product work through their MCP integration. Mix casual conversation with hands-on troubleshooting from the experts building these tools.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Joerg Schad walks through building knowledge into agents at scale with a live demo. Mix of builders, engineers, and founders in one room doing the RAG and agentic workflows thing.

Demo night · Talks & panels

Six healthcare wearable startups pitch to hardware-focused VCs and judges in real time, with feedback you'd only get watching founders defend their work in person. If you build or fund physical products, this is where the hardware scene actually congregates.

Demo night

A night for hardware builders to show off robots and prototypes while engineers and curious folks explore what's actually possible to build. Two grand in prizes and direct access to the teams making physical products.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Xvibe.ai and FeverHub.ai explore where AI-generated content meets intimate devices, examining how creators own their work and what consent means in digital intimacy. A rare candid conversation with founders, VCs, and hardware partners on building the next generation of SexTech responsibly.

Workshop / hands-on · Mixer / networking

HyperFrames' team brings a camera crew to help you shoot and polish a launch video on the spot. Solid if you're ready to make your product announcement look professionally done without the usual friction.

Talks & panels

Why did one candidate reject a $1.5M offer for $750K, while another recruiting change cost a company 2,000 hires in five months? Ryan Silvers shares what he learned recruiting for AWS and Meta: hiring problems aren't separate issues but symptoms of a broken system.

Mixer / networking

Atoms is emerging from stealth with a robotics and AI focus, hosting an informal gathering during SF Tech Week to meet the founders and investors shaping the next wave. Worth showing up if you want to see what's moving in applied AI and embodied intelligence without the pitch deck formality.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Canyon's diving into edge AI and V2X sensor architecture for connected bikes, with a technical breakdown of their PREDICT system. Mix of hands-on tech, athlete perspectives, and mobility industry folks if you're thinking about safety and sensor fusion at the edge.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

A fireside chat on open-weight models and AI sovereignty with the people actually buying GPU capacity and running inference at scale. Expect sharp takes on stack control, lock-in risks, and where compute buyers should dig in.

Mixer / networking

This is for the people actually building roadmaps at Series B+ and enterprise companies, not the founder circuit flooding Tech Week. Real conversations with engineering, product, and talent leaders from Tesla, NVIDIA, Visa, and others wrestling with the same staffing and AI productivity questions.

Talks & panels

Robot learning has a data bottleneck, and every serious lab is racing to solve it. This series opener digs into how teams source and scale human video for VLA training and what actually comes next.

Mixer / networking

Policy, nonprofit, and private sector leaders designing benchmarks that actually matter for AI evaluation. This rare convening focuses on governance and trustworthy standards as the evaluation ecosystem scales.

Demo night · Talks & panels

Founders with real traction share the stage with comedians at this Signal and Women in STEM Comedy mashup. Selection rewards what you've actually built and your learning velocity, not pitch quality, staged with serious audience energy.

Mixer / networking

Honors Fund is meeting SF founders and builders for a casual drink at Teeth Bar, with food covered and the team around to chat. They've backed 29 startups so far and are hunting for more campus-connected founders to fund through first checks and a $150k pitch competition.

Talks & panels · Workshop / hands-on

Your AI stack got 100x smarter while your sales pipeline stayed stuck. Watch GTM engineers build real solutions live with Jordan Crawford, Kyle Norton, and Eric Nowoslawski before Sculpt.

Mixer / networking

A curated happy hour for impact entrepreneurs, investors, and nonprofit leaders building for lasting positive change. Molecular cocktails and light bites at SF's premier venture club, with space strictly limited.

Talks & panels

Infrastructure is getting stressed by AI workloads in new ways, and this conversation digs into where current systems break and what still needs building. Founders and engineers across the stack discuss the invisible foundation that'll define the next generation of software.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Zoom's showing unreleased productivity agents built to kill meeting overhead and keep your best ideas alive. Get first access, direct time with their Head of Productivity Agents, and actually vote on what ships next.

Talks & panels

Retail real estate leaders discussing how AI actually fits into their operating model, not hype. A curated room separating real opportunities from noise, focused on practical evolution rather than disruption.

Mixer / networking

Small roundtable on AI's role in American manufacturing, from parts sourcing to procurement. Operators, builders, and investors discussing where AI actually moves the needle in production bottlenecks.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

This one's about voice agents at scale, especially beyond English-speaking markets. Real builders sharing what's working, what isn't, with demos and actual conversation over drinks.

Mixer / networking

Network with fintech operators and investors in a room built for deal-making, hosted by advisory firm Scalepoint and legal powerhouse Manatt. This is lighter-touch than a pitch session, but the connections here run deep across lending and specialty finance.

Mixer / networking

Twenty founders and tech executives gather at a storied Italian spot for a four-course Tuscan dinner with seat rotations, hosted by Sirius, BITKRAFT Ventures, and Rho. No panels or pitches, just thoughtful introductions and real conversations among people who understand what it takes to build and lead.

Talks & panels

Museums are deciding what to automate and what to protect as AI reshapes how collections get catalogued, exhibited, and accessed. Bay Area and Swiss museum leaders discuss where they've drawn the line and what curatorial authority means when anyone can rework digitized archives.

Mixer / networking

Databricks is hosting a straightforward networking evening for founders and startup leaders across the SF tech scene. Low-pressure mingling with cocktails and light bites, 21+ only.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Legal work, organizational risk, and public services are all getting reshaped by AI, making this a rare chance to connect founders, investors, lawyers, and government leaders thinking through what's next. Club345's fifth-floor terrace overlooking the city beats a conference room.

Talks & panels · Demo night

AI agents are becoming serious product users, and growth teams need to rethink their entire playbook. Hear from operators at Browserbase, Weights & Biases, and Apify on making products actually agent-ready.

Hackathon

Party is making code collaborative like Figma did design, and this hackathon lets you build alongside agents and 50 other founders, engineers, and product leaders in real time. You'll ship something public, pocket three months free credits, and actually feel what the future of team building looks like.

Mixer / networking

Casual Wednesday night mixer for pre-seed founders and VCs to share ideas, find co-founders, and get early investor feedback. Just bring your elevator pitch and tap into the Bay Area startup ecosystem.

Mixer / networking

Gen Z Tea has run 12+ mixers with 2,000+ attendees, drawing founders, funders, and builders from Meta to Morgan Stanley across AI, fintech, and crypto. Network with fellow Gen Z founders, make three new connections, and find your next collaboration.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Sonilo's gathering the creative AI builders on Mission Bay with 150+ founders, engineers, and creators shipping across video, music, and sound. Fifteen minutes of demos and talks, then the whole night for waterfront networking with actual food and drinks.

Talks & panels

Women-led pre-seed startups pitch directly to angels and investors in an intimate, founder-focused format. SheFundraises is cutting the party aspect to maximize meaningful connections during SF Tech Week.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Srinivas Njay from interface.ai breaks down what actually shipping agents in regulated industries demands: compliance-first architecture, audit trails that hold up, and systems where hallucinations are reportable incidents. Dinner and open conversation with founders and engineers building AI in finance, healthcare, insurance, and legal where the regulatory layer drives the design.

Demo night

Uhura Bionics debuts Whitney, an electrolarynx that restores voice quality beyond current technology, with its CEO performing live after laryngectomy. See the hardware, hear it in concert, and meet the team building voice restoration for the laryngectomee community and investors.

Mixer / networking

A networking event for people building in advertising and marketing to find collaborators and peers. Part of SFTechWeek, so you'll spot founders and operators actually shipping in the space.

Workshop / hands-on

A hands-on workshop that puts you in the room negotiating funding as either a VC or publisher, with real trade-offs but none of the actual risk. You'll leave with a concrete framework for which path actually fits your project, plus a visceral sense of how these relationships differ in practice.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

COOs and product leads from Coinbase, Linear, Plaid, and Warp discuss what makes a brand feel inevitable in an AI world. Practical insights on scaling technical innovation without sacrificing design simplicity.

Mixer / networking

The Czech and Slovak tech community gathers annually to connect and share what's happening back home and in the Bay Area. Solid networking if you're building with folks from the region or just want to see who else is here.

Mixer / networking

By midweek of Tech Week you'll be overloaded on handshakes and panels. This one at Slash HQ strips it back: drinks, founders, and actual conversation with Goodwater and Collide Capital in the room.

Workshop / hands-on

If you're building in a new category or solving a problem your audience doesn't have language for yet, this workshop helps you connect founder story to company positioning and turn it into messaging people remember. Walk away with clearer positioning, a stronger narrative, and a 30-day visibility action plan.

Workshop / hands-on

Most voice-AI projects fail at deployment, not training. This working session breaks down a real food-distributor setup to show the phone-to-ERP path, cost math, and rollback planning that actually matters.

Talks & panels

A narrative film followed by facilitated conversation on AI in schools, from someone who taught in classrooms for a decade before making it. Rare chance to hear what this actually looks like from inside a school, not from someone selling a position.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Three engineers share what they actually built: agent orchestration for health benefits, scaling a developer platform, and teaching AI to do tax research. Substance-focused talks from Corridor, Delphi, and Sphere for the SF AI engineering crowd.

Mixer / networking

Top GPs, LPs, and institutional allocators breaking bread at a private table with zero pitches or panels. Twenty carefully selected investors having the conversations that actually move capital.

Mixer / networking

Giga Energy's private Oktoberfest gathers founders and investors building AI infrastructure, data centers, and energy systems. Talk shop with the people actually powering the next wave of compute.

Mixer / networking

NXTVC's first national gathering brings junior VCs from across the country to actually talk shop without the performance theater. If you're full-time pre-partner and looking to build your inner circle early, this is where that happens.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Perplexity's Growth team breaks down how they approach experimentation and AI product building with their founders and leadership. If you're curious about growth engineering or exploring your next role, this fireside chat plus open networking is worth the application.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Finance leaders and frontier AI builders discussing what's actually shifting in the industry right now. Networking event hosted by AfterQuery and Goldman Sachs worth showing up for if you're building in this space.

Mixer / networking

A mixer bringing founders, investors, and GTM leaders into one room during SF Tech Week, exactly the kind of night where deals and co-founder matches actually happen. Good drinks and the network that matters if you're raising, writing checks, or scaling.

Talks & panels

Ben Goertzel has spent two decades building OpenCog Hyperon and MeTTa to pursue AGI that's decentralized, reasoned, and inspectable rather than controlled by a few companies. This conversation explores what beneficial AGI actually means and whether this architecture offers a fundamentally different path forward.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders pitch each other's companies on the spot with no prep, then watch the actual founder react. It's a humbling, hilarious way to stress-test your story when the polish gets stripped away.

Mixer / networking

Fieldguide's showing off their new space with the team building agentic firms for trust practitioners. Casual happy hour vibe if you want to see what they're working on in this specific vertical.

Mixer / networking

USC alumni and their network converge during SF Tech Week to connect with founders, investors, and operators from HubSpot, Pebl, Salmon Labs, and beyond. A straightforward mixer if you're looking to build relationships across the Bay Area tech scene.

Mixer / networking

One table, one conversation with Kathryn Vatt, a former USPTO examiner and IP strategist, diving into what actually makes companies defensible. Bring real questions about patents and trademarks if you're serious about moat-building beyond the pitch deck.

Mixer / networking

Venture5 convenes 200+ senior VCs and allocators who've made recent moves, with past attendees representing $70 billion AUM. A networking evening built for celebrating and connecting with investors actively reshaping their firms and funds.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Canadian founders and operators scaling in the Bay meet peers, investors, and fellow north-of-the-border builders during SF Tech Week. Expect panel discussion and honest conversation about raising capital, partnerships, and making key hires in the US market.

Talks & panels

Most women with capital aren't angel investing or backing funds because nobody explained how. Two female GPs break down the mechanics of both paths over drinks, covering commitment levels and where your money actually goes.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Revo Capital's new SF chapter kicks off with Turkish founders and YC alumni sharing how they got in and what comes next. Good venue to meet investors and fellow builders who've already figured out some of the hard parts.

Hackathon · Workshop / hands-on

Party's multiplayer workspace lets you build alongside agents and other founders, engineers, and designers in real-time on a shared project. You'll ship something concrete, get three months free credits, and experience what collaborative agent-assisted building actually feels like.

Mixer / networking

South Asian founders and operators converging during SF Tech Week to build real relationships and find their people. Come with what you're building and who you want to meet, light drinks included.

Mixer / networking · Talks & panels

Stripe and a16z are hosting an intimate dinner for B2B AI founders wrestling with how to price when agents, not humans, are the primary users. Hear from monetization experts and investors on whether per-seat, usage-based, or hybrid models make sense for your unit economics.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Sonilo gathers 150+ founders and builders working across creative AI video, music, and design for a waterfront evening with live product demos and lightning talks. The real draw is three hours of networking, food, and raffles with actual prizes on heated Mission Bay patios.

Mixer / networking

A relaxed dinner bringing together founders across consumer AI, vertical stacks, frontier labs, and chips. The kind of cross-ecosystem mix where you actually meet people building things you haven't heard of yet.

Mixer / networking

Silicon Boosters turns trading cards into a way to meet the builders actually shaping SF tech right now. Everyone gets a sealed pack at the door, and you'll trade with founders, engineers, and operators hunting for specific cards during tech week.

Mixer / networking

Pactto's gathering GTM leaders, designers, and creative teams to rethink how AI reshapes brand work. Practical conversation about creativity in the AI era, minus the hype.

Mixer / networking

Three historic North Beach and Chinatown bars in one night, designed for founders who want to actually talk to each other instead of sitting in another panel. The walk between spots gives you natural conversation breaks and a genuine reason to keep these connections going.

Workshop / hands-on · Mixer / networking

Two group exercises designed to uncover what's blocking your team's creativity and how to break past it. You'll walk out with concrete brainstorming techniques and a network of people actually shipping things.

Mixer / networking

Most US teams hiring their first India engineers use US salary data and wonder why retention tanks. This working dinner covers actual comp benchmarks, why enterprise talent struggles in startups, and the operational fit that predicts who stays.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Xchange Fashion launches their inventory-to-revenue AI platform during SF Tech Week with professional headshots, styling consultations, and a Silicon Valley-inspired runway show. Worth the trip if you need updated branding and want to see fashion tech in action.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

First 100 Women in AI report launches with data from 1,000+ operators and researchers, alongside a new podcast featuring honorees discussing what's next in AI. Built for women founding and operating AI companies at every stage.

Mixer / networking

The car service experience is ripe for disruption, and this casual meetup brings together founders and operators actually thinking through where AI and software fit. Expect real conversation about what's broken, what's fixable, and what the next generation of car ownership tools might actually look like.

Mixer / networking

Colored name tags signal whether you're founding, joining, or investing, cutting through the usual happy hour small talk. Dogpatch waterfront setting during Tech Week makes this the right place to find actual cofounders before the hackathon later that week.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Robotics investors and founders networking with live robot fights demos and speakers from Playground Global, Ultimate Bots, and Polymath Robotics. This one's built for people actively fundraising or writing checks in hard tech.

Talks & panels

Most teams waste money on context and cheap models that retry endlessly. This session cuts through the actual levers: routing work to the right tier and building a code intelligence layer so your expensive models think instead of search.

Mixer / networking

Truffle Security is hosting security leaders and practitioners at Quince for an evening of farm-to-table cuisine and peer conversation in Jackson Square. Three Michelin stars and real industry networking beats the standard conference circuit.

Mixer / networking

A chance to decompress with fellow Midwest transplants during SF Tech Week without sitting through another panel. VC-backed gathering where you can actually compare notes on regional differences and find your people.

Mixer / networking

People building agent networks for research collaboration will find real peers here, especially if you're thinking about how agents coordinate and share knowledge at scale. Tiptree's hosting dinner and drinks to make the conversation actually happen.

Mixer / networking

Marketing and sales leaders meet for a candid dinner to untangle where demand gets lost between teams. This isn't about presentations, just comparing notes on what actually works at fast-growing companies.

Mixer / networking

A no-agenda evening in a 1908 bank building where GTM leaders and founders actually talk shop over drinks. Intimate enough to make real connections, curated enough to skip the noise.

Mixer / networking · Talks & panels

Prime Intellect is hosting a research-focused happy hour during COLM week where you can dig into reinforcement learning, post-training, multi-agent systems, and self-improving approaches with their team. Bring a paper, project, or question if you want substantive technical conversations beyond the usual networking drinks.

Workshop / hands-on

You'll set up a working AI agent in one evening that automates your repetitive work across Gmail, Slack, Notion, and your CRM. Hands-on, no theory, you leave with it running and ready to handle your actual daily tasks.

Talks & panels

Explores why we measure athletes obsessively but barely instrument knowledge work, tracing measurement history from ancient Greece through modern wearables. A sharp evening questioning what we're missing about cognitive performance optimization.

Mixer / networking

A networking evening connecting Czech and Slovak tech professionals across the Bay Area. Good for building relationships with founders and operators from that community while hearing their approaches to building here.

Mixer / networking

A private spin class where Metaview's assembled their favorite people from the SF tech scene for some actual downtime during Tech Week. Free workout, swag, and genuine hanging out beats another panel any day.

Mixer / networking

The pace of invention has outrun our ability to name it, and this casual gathering explores how founders and builders shape categories before language settles. A conversation about what happens when we recognize something's new before agreeing on what it actually is.

Demo night

Three builders demo their work to a room determined to find every flaw. If the crowd isn't convinced, they take a shot and get 60 seconds to defend themselves.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Pacific Fusion and Stanford professors walk through fusion tech and research, then students and industry builders network on what's actually getting built. This is the rare moment when people shipping nuclear energy meet the next generation deciding whether to join them.

Mixer / networking

A 3v3 basketball tournament built for the startup crowd, where founders and investors can actually compete instead of just networking over drinks. Bring your team or show up to watch, but know that spots fill fast and captains need to commit early.

Mixer / networking

Cogent and Bain Capital Ventures are back with Round 3 of their monthly mahjong night, now with higher stakes for SF Tech Week. Professional instructors welcome all skill levels, and the first 20 arrivals get exclusive merch.

Mixer / networking

Small dinner with European founders and Frontline Ventures investors talking through the actual hard parts of building, off-the-record and unfiltered. This is the kind of conversation you don't get at bigger events.

Mixer / networking

Four cash game tables, drinks, and music hosted by hardware, venture, and HR platforms looking to build community. Low-key way to meet founders and investors if you're in the SF tech scene.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

EliseAI and Baseten dig into finetuning and continuous retraining for open-source models shipping in high-stakes domains like housing and healthcare. Fireside talk at 6pm, then Mario Kart.

Mixer / networking

A chance to connect with other angels and operators actually writing checks into AI startups. Good for finding deal flow, co-investment partners, and the kind of shop talk that happens best over drinks.

Mixer / networking

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Voice AI faces a hard trade-off: models that think deeply are too slow for natural conversation, while fast models lack the reasoning depth that moments demand. Researchers from leading voice startups tackle this core problem in 25 minutes, then open the bar to keep talking through what actually makes AI conversational.

Mixer / networking

A proper steak dinner in Cupertino for solo founders building tech companies, with investors who actually want to back founder-led companies. Honest conversation about building without a cofounder, no pitches or networking theater.

Mixer / networking

A seated dinner connecting SF investors with Korean founders from Quetta Labs who are raising globally. This is where you meet the builders before Demo Day, off the record and over one long table.

Mixer / networking

Small group pizza night in Hayes Valley where operators and builders actually talk instead of pitch. Approval keeps it intimate enough that conversations stick around after the slice is gone.

Mixer / networking

A curated dinner for Series A+ founders designed to actually slow down during Tech Week. Small group, one table, conversations that matter with peers who understand what you're building.

Demo night

INVO Station is launching its Air Maps platform for autonomous flying vehicles in SF, bringing eVTOL ride-hailing from concept to reality. Expect live demos of the integrated app, ecosystem deep-dives, and networking with aerospace engineers and founders actually building urban air mobility.

Mixer / networking

Spring Fertility and Our Third Place are hosting a women's health focused mixer during SF Tech Week with fireside chats, networking, and wellness activities. Worth attending if you want substantive conversation about health and fertility alongside the usual tech crowd.

Mixer / networking

Swedish house music, quality drinks, and the people actually building AI companies in SF. Worth showing up to meet founders, investors, and ecosystem folks in a setting where conversations actually happen.

Mixer / networking

Purpose:Labs is testing whether handshakes can carry real context instead of surface-level details, creating a different starting point for conversations. Worth experiencing if you're tired of the standard networking script and want to actually connect with founders, investors, and builders.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Healthcare AI lives or dies on data foundations, regulation, and trust, not model benchmarks. A cancer surgeon, DeepMind researcher, and Verily engineering leader discuss what actually moves complex systems forward in production.

Mixer / networking

Electric go-kart racing with Monaco and Stripe beats another tech week mixer. Tight crew of founders competing for lap times and bragging rights while the taco bar fuels the trash talk.

Mixer / networking

Appen's hosting a no-nonsense happy hour during COLM week with researchers and AI builders actually talking shop over drinks and city views. Limited space, so this fills up fast with the people worth knowing in the frontier AI scene.

Mixer / networking

Enclosure's gathering with teams from OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI centers on civilizational-scale AI containment research, from data center security to multi-agent swarms. Come for technical conversations with researchers actively shipping safety infrastructure, plus sushi and an ice sculpture of an H100 rack.

Mixer / networking

Abaka AI's hosting an Italian-Japanese dinner at a hidden art deco venue, exclusive to COLM attendees with confirmed spots. Network with AI researchers and engineers over Tuscan wine in one of SF's most beautiful rooms.

Talks & panels

Three Harvard, Columbia, and Stanford researchers-turned-founders discuss how AI and multi-omics are reshaping personalized medicine, with live single-cell RNA sequencing analysis. This is biotech infrastructure thinking from people actually building it.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Engineers, PMs, and VCs who actually do stand-up on Netflix and network without the corporate theater. Free drinks, top comedians, and the kind of room where shipping something real matters more than pitching it.

Mixer / networking

Goodfire's interpretability team is hosting an intimate happy hour with drinks, bites, and vinyl nearby the convention center. Space is tight and they're prioritizing people working in interpretability, alignment, or AI for life sciences.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Structured pitch night where selected founders get direct investor feedback in five minutes flat, followed by casual networking. Smart move if you're either fundraising or scouting early-stage teams in SF's AI scene.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Founders and AI systems alike confess their failures in this brutally honest night from ValkaAI. You'll hear what actually breaks in production from people shipping real products, not their polished demos.

Mixer / networking

A rare night of intentional human connection: 1,000 strangers in San Francisco meeting five carefully matched people over ice cream, with no pitching or networking required. Five encounters, five flavors, five stories you'll actually remember.

Mixer / networking

Guillermo Rauch and Jack Altman are hosting dinner with founders working on AI evals and benchmarking. A rare chance to hear from builders actually shipping these infrastructure pieces and figure out where the space is heading.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Jaspers Terminal is launching an open-source platform for agentic investment research, demoing it with founders and portfolio managers during TechWeek. Priority access for quant researchers and active investors who want to see how agents are reshaping financial analysis.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Five founders pitch in five minutes each at Rick & Roxy's, then the room asks the questions that actually matter. Stay at your chosen table for the hour instead of working the room, grab the group chat afterward, and watch how other founders handle the question you've been avoiding.

Mixer / networking

Tokyo-based REHATCH brings their marketing playbook to SF for dinner and direct conversations with their leadership team. A rare chance to explore Japan's $53B market dynamics and AI's role in marketing with folks building across regions.

Talks & panels

Milad Alucozai walks through what it takes to build, exit, and then invest in the next wave. Candid stories from both the founder and investor side of the table, limited seating.

Workshop / hands-on

Patent filing with AI can save time but also create hidden liabilities. Landfall IP walks through what general purpose models can actually handle, common failure modes, and a framework for deciding what to pressure test before filing.

Talks & panels

The Moon is about to host permanent settlements for the first time, and the 1967 treaty governing space has massive gaps nobody anticipated. This panel digs into resource ownership, competing superpowers, and what happens when safety zones overlap.

Mixer / networking

Penthouse networking with the Bay's sharpest GTM minds, no corporate theater required. A rare setup for founders and operators who actually know what they're doing to find their people.

Mixer / networking

Precixion is showing how agentic AI handles the complexity of 3D metal printing for defense and space applications. Worth attending if you're curious about AI moving from chat interfaces into physical manufacturing workflows.

Demo night · Mixer / networking

Founders pitch live products while you grab pizza and drinks at this Tech Week demo night from Infragrid and Corgi. Good for meeting builders, investors, and figuring out what's actually shipping in the AI space right now.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Understand the gap between posting content and actually converting attention into business growth. A panel with founders and creators who've cracked this, plus live feedback on attendee content strategies.

Mixer / networking

Security leaders from across industries gather for off-the-record conversations over Michelin Star food. The kind of dinner where you'll hear what actually keeps people up at night, not what they say in public.

Talks & panels · Mixer / networking

Your production history is already a test suite if you know how to use it. Three engineers from Salesforce, DoorDash, and ZenML share how they replay real sessions against every change to catch problems before users do.

Mixer / networking

Clouted brings &FRIENDS, the massive Asian EDM festival that's hosted Porter Robinson and Zedd, to San Francisco Tech Week. This is the midweek reset the builder crowd actually wants to show up for.

Talks & panels · Demo night

Three panels on where AI actually moves the needle in longevity: functional food, peptides, and home screening hardware. Founders, researchers, and investors bridge the gap between lab science and what you can ship today.

Talks & panels

Milad Alucozai of Pamir Ventures shares unfiltered lessons from building, exiting, and backing founders. You get dual perspective from someone who's lived both the operator and investor sides.

Mixer / networking

Fundrise's $VCX team is hosting an intimate dinner to explore what AI-native applications look like beyond the SaaS playbook. Real conversation about where the money sees opportunity as the pace of change keeps accelerating.

Mixer / networking

Arcophos is gathering researchers, founders, and investors around Italian food to talk about building AI healthcare systems from scratch. Worth showing up if you're thinking about this space and want to meet people actually working on frontier problems.

Mixer / networking

Trillion Labs is hosting an open networking night at COLM for researchers, builders, and founders working on mixture of experts. Drinks and direct conversation with people actually shipping scaled models.

Mixer / networking

Mission-driven founders and nonprofit leaders gather to find collaborators and advance social impact projects across the Bay Area. Free entry, open mic pitches, and table slots available for organizations wanting to demo their work.

Mixer / networking

A cantina break from tech week featuring Mexican Lotería, poker, and free pizza while you play for stablecoin prizes. No buy-in, just bring your wallet and compete for money sent straight to your Pesito app.

Mixer / networking

Small dinner for in-house legal operators and builders actually shipping legal AI, skipping the usual panel talk for real conversation about what works. No vendor noise, just candid discussion on execution and the actual impact of AI on legal work.

Mixer / networking · Demo night

A live game show where the room votes on fake job applications, then survivors pitch themselves and face a panel armed with their real resume plus workplace scandals they've never heard of. Networking that actually works because the show manufactures introductions between people who all speak the same language: job hunt.

Mixer / networking

A tight gathering for builders in urban tech, computer vision, and AI infrastructure: real estate operators, civic tech founders, and investors exploring the physical-digital stack. Low-key conversations over sake and whiskey, with founders sharing how to run video analytics on ultra-low cloud costs.

Mixer / networking

Voaige is convening researchers, founders, and investors applying neuroscience to AI for an informal evening during SF Tech Week. No talks or pitches, just drinks and real conversation with people worth knowing who are working on the same questions.

Mixer / networking

BullAI's after party during SF Tech Week is where you actually meet the builders and get the scene intel over drinks and music. Casual enough to relax, connected enough to matter.

Mixer / networking

A curated dinner during SF Tech Week for founders, investors, and operators aligned on building profitable companies with purpose. The guest list is tight, the conversations are designed to spark working relationships, and the crowd actually cares about impact alongside returns.

Mixer / networking

Fourteen investors and one imposter walk into a private dinner during SF Tech Week with no pitches, just sharp conversation and a mystery to solve. By dessert you'll be interrogating the room to figure out who doesn't belong.

Mixer / networking

High-stakes poker with founders and investors who actually matter in the SF AI scene. Boardy screens everyone beforehand so the room stays sharp and the connections count.

Mixer / networking

SR007 cohort celebration hosted by Persona and Mercury with actual poker tables, drinks, and music. Good excuse to meet batch mates in a relaxed setting that beats another networking mixer.

Mixer / networking

Speedrun founders across cohorts gathering at the new HQ for late-night food, drinks, and talk. Quick toast from speedrun and OpenAI teams, but mostly just space to connect with people building AI companies.