LeWeb
Spending a few days in Paris attending LeWeb for the first time. Have wanted to attend for many years but for various reasons have never managed to get here but determined this year and glad I have. It is probably the most important and popular conference in Europe and it comes through with the number of sessions, speakers and sponsors. The conference is spread across several buildings and has two main stages and several workshops.
Getting here was easy enough and checkin was simple as well, in fact I was able to pick up my entry badge on Monday thus making life much easier this morning when I got here via the Metro. The conference comes with a very extensive programme and a bit of work is needed up front to decide what sessions to attend across the two stages.
This morning the first session was a discussion with Fred Wilson. I’ve followed his blog for some time and heard him speak on video last year. He has an excellent job investing in early stage companies throughout the world and as you would expect he has a very good view of what is going to happen in the future. One of the biggest improvement areas in 215 will be health and wellness, the sector has grown this year and will continue to rocket next year. So if you are looking for investment if you are in this area you have managed to get over the first hurdle. He also talked a lot about electric cars and driverless cars and the growth in that area over the coming year, will post more on this later. Throughout the show there are a lot of speakers from various VCs who have over the years raised many millions of dollars and what is still as clear as it was 10 years ago is that if you are in Silicon Valley you have access to a much wider set of funds.
What is interesting about the conference attendees is the range of people attending from all sorts of ages and it is not so male dominated which is a good thing.
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Having a small specialist cinema nearby is very handy as they show all sorted of films from the mainstream to the unusual and ones that have not been in the cinema for some years. I headed out to the Abbeygate cinema, used to be part of the Picturehouse chain, to watch a 1947 film called It’s a Wonderful Life. Wasn’t sure what to expect and whether I would enjoy it but settling down in the comfy seat with a glass of red I was ready. It was very good and well worth watching so will be looking out for other oldies that they show.
