NextGen Conference – a great success!
Posted: November 25th, 2009 | Author: Cory Levy | Filed under: Entrepreneurship | Tags: cory levy, founders fund, next gen conference, nextgenconf, stanford | CommentsThis past summer, I had an externship at the Founders Fund in San Francisco. One of the results from this internship was that Justin Fishner-Wolfson inspired and encouraged me to run a conference. The goal of my conference, NextGen Conference, was to bring together young, first-time entrepreneurs with more experienced and seasoned entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. About ten days ago, this conference was a reality. On November 14th at Stanford University, NextGen Conference took place.
Over the last few months, I created an All Star speaker lineup – Jeff Clavier, Kevin Hartz, Keith Rabois, Dan Olsen, Larry Chiang, and many more. There was representation from the Founders Fund, Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, Maples Investments, Soft Tech VC, and many more venture capital firms. With such an awesome group of speakers, I expected ticket sales to come easy. My goal was to make this event no larger than seventy-five people. Shockingly, twenty-five days ago, zero people were registered for my conference. However, with much help and support from the speakers, my event was sold out! We reached full capacity! Students and young entrepreneurs from Stanford, Berkeley, SF State, Cal Poly, and the University of Illinois were in attendance. Our sponsors included: Minogi.com, Intel, Verizon Wireless, and Macgasm.net. Both Intel and Verizon Wireless came on board seventy-two hours before the event.
At the after party I overheard someone say, “I learned more at NextGen Conference than at TechCrunch 50”. Positive feedback and requests for more events like NextGen Conference have flooded my inbox in the last two weeks. Because of that, there will probably be a NextGen Conference in 2010!
Shout out goes to Daniel Brusilovsky. Even though he was not present at NextGen Conference, Daniel helped use his contacts to help NextGen Conference. Because of Daniel’s contact, Brady Valentino, our site, www.nextgenconf.com looks beautiful! Also, Daniel helped sign Intel as a sponsor.
