IDCEE is a high-scale international gathering of investors, startups, leaders of IT-companies, geeks and bloggers in Ukraine and it’s an entry point to the emerging markets of CEE and CIS.

In 2013, the focus of the IDCEE.org, Internet Technologies and Innovations conference, is startups and geeks. Program was widened with a new stream – Tech Stage (a corner for CTOs of the world global web companies). Another addition is tickets for geeks. Besides the three traditional cash prizes with total value of EUR 30,000, participants of Startup Alley will have a chance to compete for three new nominations. Startups will also have an opportunity to pitch in front of the representatives of the world leading accelerators, and all this will be done in a form of harsh speed-pitches – Startup Toasters.

IDCEE 2013 will take place on October 10-11, and will present a lot of new features. Besides a new venue (from now on, it will be NSC Olimpiyskiy – an easy to get spot in the city center), IDCEE introduces a new stream – Tech Stage – a platform for CTOs of the global successful web companies.
“IDCEE mission is to develop IT entrepreneurship“, says Viktoriya Tigipko, Managing Director of TA Venture VC fund and organizer of IDCEE. “It can stem only through the synergy of business approaches and tech solutions. We’ve created Tech Stage for business leaders and CEOs-to-be of web companies. We want them to have an opportunity to feel the atmosphere of technologies. And developers should be able to find common language with entrepreneurial network. Emergence of new projects after the conference is our contribution to the establishment of IT entrepreneurship ecosystem in Ukraine.”

Rasmus Lerdorf, a PHP creator, tech architects of the world biggest corporations such as Microsoft (Mark Zbikowski, having contributed 25 years to the company, and a key developer of several Windows versions; and Beat Schwegler, Director Cloud Evangelism) and Amazon (Technical Evangelist Steffen Krause), as well as Stas Khirman (a former Kiev citizen, now CTO of Deutsche Telecom Hosted Business Services) and many others will share their experience at Tech Stage. Ruslan Synytskyy (CTO of Jelastic, one of the most promising Ukrainian companies that is conquering the global market) is confident that “the IDCEE conference is a great opportunity for talented IT entrepreneurs to gain additional knowledge and experience and to build the network community with the right people. It’s a good chance to meet, mix and mingle with icons and legends of IT industry”.

Besides Tech Stage, IDCEE will also host traditional streams: Main Stage and Startup Stage, which will host the headliners of the world Internet business.

More than 50 speakers will be sharing their experience and best practices, and among them are:

• Alan Patricof, Founder and Managing Director of Greycroft Partners – one of the pioneers in VC industry, creator of many successful media projects, including media giant Huffington Post;
• Mark Tluszcz, Co-founder and Managing Director of Mangrove Capital – regular fellow in Forbs Midas List, one of Skype backers, who believes in talent and power of European developers, and who constantly travels across Europe hungry for the next big thing;
• Daphne Koller, Co-founder and CEO of the online education platform Coursera, which managed to attract almost 5M users across the world for just 1,5 years of its existence, and which secured more than $1M in investments;
• Jason Bigler, Leader for Google’s display ads business in EMEA, who will tell about the evolution and revolution of programmatic media buying;
• Alexander Zacke, CEO of online auction site Auctionata that is challenging the monopoly of such old-time auction houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Recently, Auctionata has set a record in auction business when it sold a watercolor by Egon Schiele for EUR 1,8M;
• Sina Afra, former eBay fellow, one of the main business angels in Turkey and Founder of the Turkish platform Markafoni – an e-commerce project that was the first one to expand beyond the boundaries of Turkey and succeed on the global market.

Main Stage will also feature 8 panel discussions. Among others, panelists will be talking about:

1. Mobile and online payments. The next innovation wave in mobile payments in CEE: who will survive?
2. Online education. Are online courses the future of online education?
3. VC funds. Agency model: new trend for VC smart money.
4. Accelerators. Startup accelerators in CEE: Local accelerators vs. Western accelerator. Are they competitors or partners?
5. e-Commerce. Offline to Online: via marketplace or e-commerce, or online brand?
6. Online tools for food delivery. Online food delivery business: What are the key success factors and potential for growth in the CEE market?
7. CEE Success Stories. Rising tech stars from the East: What makes them shine?
8. Brazil panel. Starting online business and investing in Brazil: what lessons are there to learn for tech entrepreneurs and investors in CEE?

By tradition, one of the biggest panel discussions at IDCEE will be dedicated to one of emerging markets.
Last year in was India, and this time it is Brazil.
Brazil is one of the biggest Internet markets of the world (TOP-10) that is growing exponentially. 40% of Brazilians are regular Internet users. Among 10 largest online markets, Brazil ranks 5th in engagement. Brazil is the second country in the world with the widest use of Facebook and Twitter. It is estimated that by 2015, at least half of Brazilian population will have a mobile phone with Internet access. The IDCEE Ambassador, Managing Partner of Eastlabs Eveline Butchatskiy (Brazilian by origin) adds: “We are excited about 2013 focus on the booming internet market in Brazil, and hope to learn from the widely successful Brazilian entrepreneurs on how to build fast-growing startups in emerging markets like Ukraine“.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR STARTUPS
This year IDCEE wants to make an experiment, and it has decided to introduce a new category of attendees – geeks. This category is designed for those who are to start their own business – freelancers, developers, designers, who are tired of routine and want to create their own business. For them, IDCEE can be an excellent chance to find inspiration, learn the latest business trends and find potential partners for implementation of their ideas. There is a special ticker price for geeks – EUR 149.

The IDCEE Startup Alley is the biggest in Eastern Europe. Annually, it gathers more than 150 startups. 12 preselected semi-finalists will compete for three main cash prizes (EUR 15,000, EUR 10,000, and EUR 5,000 respectively) and will pitch their ventures on Main Stage.

The panel of judges on Main Stage will consist of Marcin Hejka (Intel Capital), Uwe Horstmann (Project A Ventures), Pavel Bogdanov (Almaz Capital Partners), Cem Sertoglu (Earlybird Venture Capital), Leon Zilber (Siguler Guff), and Dmitry Chikhachev (Runa Capital).

To provide startups with more opportunities to pitch, the IDCEE conference has created a new platform of “harsh” speed-pitches – Startup Toasters.
Startups will get an expert valuation from the renowned mentors and best incubators and accelerators of the world. Among the judges at Startup Toasters will be Jon Bradford from TechStars London (which is considered to be a #1 accelerator in the world), Andy Shannon from StartupBootcamp (a global accelerator network present in more than 30 countries), and Eveline Butchatskiy from Ukrainian incubator EastLabs. The best startup according to jury will get an opportunity to pitch at StartupBootcamp without prior selection.

In addition to that, to attract more attention to Ukrainian startups, IDCEE together with its partners has created awards in three new nominations:

• Best Ukrainian Startup in partnership with innovation park Bionic Hill (the winner will receive EUR 3,000);
• Best Interactive in partnership with Bigmir.net (the winner will receive an advertising package from Bigmir worth UAH 100,000);
• Best Consumer Startup in partnership with Yandex (the winner will receive EUR 3,000 for advertising and promotion).

“This an additional incentive for Ukrainian IT entrepreneurs to take part in IDCEE, as well as one more step to creating an innovation ecosystem in Ukraine“, says Victor Galasyuk, First Vice-President of innovation park Bionic Hill. “Development of startup ecosystem in Ukraine is of direct interest to innovation park Bionic Hill, which will open its doors to the first residents in the beginning of 2015“.

Annually, IDCEE is attended by more than 300 VC funds and business angels that are actively working in Central and Eastern Europe and CIS.
Among them were Esther Dyson, Tim Draper, Drew Guff, Andreas Haug, Stefan Glaenzer, Joachim Schoss, Rajesh Sawhney, Brian Feinstein, Jose Marin, Igor Taber, Greg Williams, Alex Barrera, as well VC funds like Accel Partners, Almaz Capital Partners, Earlybird Venture Capital, H-Farm Ventures, Index Ventures, Mangrove Capital Partners, Project A Ventures, Russia Partners, Ventech and many others. The main goal of a startup at the conference is to meet his investor.

That’s why besides an intense content program, IDCEE offers an extensive networking program for communication and interaction.
Thus, the conference will be opened by one of the most enigmatic and colorful Ukrainian singers Katia Chilly. At the evening, all guests will have an opportunity to taste Ukrainian national dinner.
The second day will be dedicated to Brazil, so the star of the night will be a legendary Brazilian musician and guitar player Filo Machado.

Romanian Startups is a media partner with IDCEE.