Startup events in May 2026 – Calendar

Distributed internet and digital culture festival across Aarhus with 12,000+ attendees across 120+ events organized by local companies, media organizations, agencies, and universities. Program spans digital marketing, AI in media, e-commerce, ethical tech, and creator economy. Most sessions free with registration. Unique decentralized format makes it a good way to meet the Aarhus tech community in small, intimate settings.

Northern Europe's leading smart city and urban tech conference held in Stavanger, attracting 4,000+ attendees from 50+ countries. Focuses on sustainable cities, digital infrastructure, and mobility. Strong government and municipality buyer presence makes it ideal for GovTech startups.

OMR runs satellite late-session events through the summer in Hamburg following the main May festival. The July edition focuses on AI in marketing, social commerce, and creator-economy monetization with smaller, more intimate audiences than the main event. Tickets from EUR 50.

Curated AI conference in Berlin (Humboldt Carre) with an intimate in-person audience and virtual access, focused on the European AI ecosystem, policy, and commercialization. 2026 speaker highlights include Franziska Giffey, Prof. Antonio Krueger (DFKI), Carla Hustedt, and Dr. Ulli Waltinger; founder participation is often routed through Applied AI Stage and speaker submissions.

One of Europe's largest digital marketing and technology festivals, attracting 70,000+ attendees to Hamburg Messe. Features masterclasses, expo stages, and side events covering MarTech, creator economy, D2C, and AI-powered marketing tools.

Norway's premier business transformation conference focused on sustainability, circular economy, and climate tech. Held in Oslo and organized with support from the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise (NHO). Attracts 1,500+ executives, founders, and investors working on green transition. Tickets from EUR 300-600.

A distributed open-doors festival where Athens' startups, incubators, and investors welcome visitors for talks, demos, and networking. Free to attend with 2,000+ participants across 50+ venues. The best way to experience Greece's growing startup ecosystem firsthand.

Decentralized city-wide startup festival across 50+ partner events over nine days with 10,000+ international attendees, 1,500+ startups, and active investor matchmaking. Most sessions free or low-cost; main-stage passes around EUR 200. Tracks span social impact, smart city, life sciences, and creative tech, a key CEE entry point for founders.

Invite-focused networking and portfolio event hosted by High-Tech Gruenderfonds at STATION Berlin under the 2026 theme 'Next European Tech Renaissance.' Known for high-efficiency 1:1 investor-corporate-startup meetings and strong syndication opportunities.

Curated startup and investor conference at Habakuk Congress Centre, capped around 1,200 attendees for deal quality. Known for selected startup participation, Podim Pitching Competition, and structured 1:1 meetings.

Large CEE technology and policy event connecting scale-ups with corporate and government decision-makers. Strong fit for startups pursuing enterprise partnerships, public-sector pilots, and regional expansion.

Long-running JVM and backend conference in Krakow with 50+ expert talks on Java, Scala, Kotlin, microservices, and cloud architecture. Draws ~1,000 senior developers over two days. Strong recruiting ground for startups hiring experienced backend engineers, with a tight-knit community that values deep technical content.

Annual awards ceremony and networking event celebrating the best startups, investors, and ecosystem builders across the Nordics and Baltics. Categories include Best Newcomer, Best Fintech, and Founder of the Year.

The Luxembourg edition of the Startup Ole international roadshow, connecting early-stage startups with corporates and investors from the Greater Region (Luxembourg, Belgium, France, Germany). Features speed-dating investor sessions and pitch battles. Free for selected startups, EUR 50 general admission.

Recurring startup pitch and talent-networking series in Amsterdam (often hosted at venues such as The Social Hub), designed for pre-seed founders, angel introductions, and technical co-founder hiring. Late spring to early summer editions run as frequent community meetups rather than a single expo format.

Organized by DOU.ua, Ukraine's largest IT community platform, this annual gathering brings 2,000+ developers, product managers, and tech leaders together for talks on engineering culture, career growth, and the state of Ukrainian tech. Features panels on rebuilding and scaling Ukraine's IT sector. Free to attend.

Enterprise IT and B2B software conference with practical case studies and buyer-facing sessions. Useful for SaaS and cybersecurity startups seeking pilot contracts and distribution partnerships in Poland.

The Czech regional qualifier for Startup World Cup, offering a USD 1M global investment prize. Early-stage startups pitch to local and international VCs in Prague. A great launchpad for Czech founders seeking cross-border visibility and investment.

Premier game industry conference in Krakow featuring an indie game showcase, publisher meetings, and strong startup presence across VR/AR, AI tools, and creative tech. Attracts 2,000+ game developers, publishers, and investors. Valuable for gaming and creative-tech startups seeking publishing deals and development partnerships in the CEE region.

Billed as Europe's largest AI event, at Fiera Milano Rho with 700+ speakers, 250+ AI exhibitors, and 25,000+ attendees. Strong for founders selling AI tooling into enterprise and meeting corporate innovation buyers.

A two-day summit at EHL's Lausanne campus with 600 participants, themed on human-centric leadership and innovation; the second day is an open-innovation and investor track run by the EHL Innovation Hub. Useful for founders in hospitality, food, and experience tech seeking corporate pilot partners in the Romandie.

imec's flagship technology forum, bringing the global semiconductor and nano-electronics value chain to Antwerp. Founders in chip design, AI hardware, quantum, and sensing get direct exposure to imec research roadmaps and corporate R&D leads.

Major French healthcare and hospital innovation expo with a large innovation village for digital health ventures. High-value event for founders targeting public-hospital procurement and clinical pilot partnerships.

One of Italy's largest developer conferences, bringing together 2,000+ software engineers for talks on cloud-native, AI/ML, DevOps, and frontend. Strong venue for developer tool startups and engineering employer branding.

Deep-tech marketplace event at Wilhelm Studios Berlin covering AI, Web3, photonics, and advanced manufacturing, culminating in Berlin's Deep Tech Award ceremony. Especially relevant for R&D-heavy startups seeking patient capital and strategic industrial backers.

The 21st edition of the Trento Festival of Economics, drawing ministers, Nobel laureates, and 700+ speakers. A high-signal venue for founders tracking macro and policy shifts and meeting institutional players.

Large software and startup conference at AmberExpo with 6,000+ attendees, 500+ startups, and 200+ investors. Startup Contest offers EUR 30,000 and the agenda is especially strong for developer tools and data-heavy products.

A two-day tech and careers summit in central Vienna connecting developers, tech companies, and startups, with a job fair, talks, and networking. Useful for founders building engineering teams in the DACH region.

Ireland's first national Creative Economy Summit, bringing together founders, studio leaders, investors, and policymakers in digital creative industries. A niche but durable flagship for founders in gaming, animation, content tech, and creative IP.

Italy's largest Ethereum and Web3 conference, with 2,000+ attendees and 100+ speakers at the Leonardo da Vinci museum. A useful wedge event for web3 and crypto founders targeting the Italian and Southern-European builder community.

Southern Sweden's biggest electronics-industry expo at Sparbanken Skåne Arena, targeting design and purchasing professionals across smart city, transport, and medtech. Relevant for hardware founders in the Öresund region.

A major Web3 and blockchain conference leveraging Malta's pioneering Virtual Financial Assets Act and progressive crypto regulation. Attracts 4,000+ attendees including DeFi founders, token issuers, and regulators. Features a startup pitch competition, hackathon, and expo floor. Tickets from EUR 200-500.

The largest tech and startup festival in Cyprus and the Eastern Mediterranean, attracting 3,000+ attendees to Limassol. Features a startup pitch competition, exhibitions, and deep-dive tracks on AI, sustainability, and Web3. Strong participation from MENA and European ecosystems, reflecting Cyprus's position as a bridge between continents. Tickets from EUR 100-300.

The nationwide Swiss deep-tech catalyst event at Kursaal Bern, bringing startups, investors, corporates, and enablers together for one high-density day of 1-to-1 matchmaking, pitch sessions, and a curated deep-tech newcomers cohort. The single best day to compress months of Swiss investor and corporate introductions into a few hours.

The South-West of Ireland's leading technology conference, convening technology leaders, policymakers, and SME decision-makers around AI and emerging-tech adoption. A practical regional venue for founders selling into Munster's SME base.

A community-driven startup festival at the Van Nelle Fabriek connecting pre-seed and seed founders with investors across port and maritime, health and wellbeing, and climate and energy tracks. Strong fit for early-stage founders raising in Rotterdam's ecosystem.

Athens-based music-tech and creative-economy conference running alongside the Reworks Festival, with a dedicated business program covering music streaming, rights tech, AI in music production, and live-entertainment platforms. 2,000+ attendees from the European music-tech scene. Tickets EUR 150-400.

The Tbilisi chapter of the global Startup Grind community hosts regular fireside chats with successful founders and monthly meetups. The annual flagship event brings 300+ Georgian entrepreneurs and international speakers together. Free to attend, supported by Google for Startups.

The 10th-anniversary edition of Northern Greece's flagship two-day tech event at the Port of Thessaloniki, bringing together young scientists, executives, startups, and investment funds. A dedicated startup platform focuses on climate tech, deep tech, and AI.

Kultuurikatel-hosted summit with 3,500+ attendees and 600+ investors. The Latitude59 Pitch Competition can reach EUR 1M in syndicate investment and the program heavily features digital-state and defense-tech themes.

A week of free AI events across Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Niš, organised by Startit. The 2025 debut drew 1,000+ attendees across 23 events with 20+ partner organisations — community-driven and explicitly founder and developer-facing.

A week-long fintech, blockchain, and AI gathering across multiple Bucharest venues, positioned as a Central and Eastern Europe fintech hub event with an awards gala. Useful for fintech founders targeting the CEE market and regional investors.

Leading Polish technical security conference focused on applied hacking, incident response, and infrastructure defense. Strong venue for cybersecurity startups to validate products with practitioners and security buyers.

Central and Eastern Europe's largest SaaS conference, run as an immersive format where 300-600 founders, operators, and investors stay together at a single Adriatic resort for three days of talks, dealmaking, and side events. Strong fit for early-to-growth-stage B2B SaaS teams.

18th International Conference on Cyber Conflict by NATO CCDCOE, themed 'Securing Tomorrow'. Multidisciplinary tracks across legal, strategy, policy, and technology drawing 600+ decision-makers from ~50 countries.

The European Dialogue on Internet Governance is an open multi-stakeholder platform on internet governance, hosted by EURid at the European Commission's Charlemagne Building. The 2026 edition celebrates 20 years of .eu under the theme 'European Voices for the Future of the Internet'.

Coimbra's flagship developer conference: technical sessions plus a hands-on workshop day across Java, JavaScript and TypeScript, cloud, AI and ML, security, and architecture. For technical founders and engineers who want practical depth and to connect with Portugal's developer community beyond the Lisbon–Porto axis.

Europe's premier games-industry gathering at Slagthuset in Malmö, with conference talks, expo floor, the Nordic Game Awards, and a closing Masterclass Friday. Draws studios, publishers, and investors from across the Nordics.

SPS Italia 2026 was the 14th edition of Italy's leading trade fair for industrial automation and digital manufacturing, held 26-28 May 2026 at Fiere di Parma and organised by Messe Frankfurt Italia. The edition drew 37,528 attendees and 720 exhibitors across six pavilions, built around five core themes — cyber security, AI agents, software-defined manufacturing, robotics & Physical AI, and ESG. A Digital District (Industrial IT, Focus AI, Start-Ups, Academy), 50+ conferences across three arenas, and the SPS Italia UP Challenge for startups make it a key selling and partnership venue for industrial-tech founders.

Pan-European startup festival in Amsterdam connecting early and growth-stage founders with investors, corporate innovation teams, and ecosystem builders. Features pitch competitions, workshops, and structured networking across multiple stages.

Nordic region's leading digital-transformation expo at Kistamässan, with six co-located shows on AI & Big Data, Cloud, Cyber Security, DevOps, Data Centre, and Mobile. Free entry, 5,000+ visitors, 250+ exhibitors.

Two-day summit at the RDS in Dublin with around 8,000 attendees, 300+ speakers, and strong buyer presence from IDA-backed multinationals. Passes typically EUR 300-700 with startup rates available. Programming emphasizes B2B startup-to-enterprise partnerships across cloud, SaaS, fintech, and AI, a key pipeline for founders targeting Irish and UK buyers.

Dublin Tech Week pitch finals at Wood Quay Venue where Masters students partner with businesses to compete for the ENFUSE trophy. Connects education with enterprise development through applied research and live pitching.

Wrocław festival at the intersection of AI, business and art, organised by Startup Wrocław (ARAW) together with OVHcloud. A 26 May 'Day Zero' (kayaking on the Odra and networking) precedes two main days: 27 May brings workshops on marketing, AI, go-to-market and scaling plus Fintech Trends Poland, and 28 May a conference on AI, creativity and European cloud sovereignty with VC pitching, featuring experts from Capgemini, ZAiKS, Zowie, Bielik AI, Niebezpiecznik.pl and OVHcloud.

Europe's largest food innovation congress at Bilbao Exhibition Centre, with 250+ exhibitors and 320+ speakers covering automation, robotics, AI, packaging, and sustainability across the food and beverage value chain. Italy is 2026 guest partner country.

Poland's flagship digital marketing, advertising, and media conference, organised by IAB Polska with 80+ talks under the DIMAQ accreditation umbrella. Valuable for martech and adtech founders, and for any startup sharpening its go-to-market — it puts you in front of agencies, brands, and media buyers.

A two-day summit at the Dublin Royal Convention Centre joining clinicians, hospital managers, pharma, health-tech firms, and policy people. Relevant for digital-health and medtech founders seeking healthcare buyers and partners.

Billed as Southern Europe's largest digital health congress, drawing 3,000+ attendees and around 450 companies to the Recinte Modernista de Sant Pau. For healthtech founders it is a concentrated dealmaking venue with keynote stages, a startup exhibition, and direct access to hospitals, pharma, and investors active in digital health.

Community-driven Java and open-source conference held alongside MakeIT 2026 at Convention Centre Portus. 90+ sessions covering JVM, Spring, cloud-native Java, microservices, software architecture, and AI-assisted development tooling.

Operator-led iGaming summit at the Mediterranean Conference Centre drawing 6,000+ delegates, with sub-summits on start-up & investment, crypto, and payments. Includes a Hot Seat startup pitch format for founders meeting VCs and senior operators.

Three-day tech, business and arts festival across Athens with 10,000+ attendees, 250+ speakers, a startup competition, Founders' Day and Investors' Day, plus 70+ side events spanning AI, defense, fintech and deep tech.

Pocket Gamer Connects' first dedicated Sweden event, a focused two-day games-industry networking and dealmaking conference with an indie developer pitch competition.

Community-led Python conference in Bologna over four days with 700+ developers and maintainers, featuring talks, workshops, and a PyData track covering AI and data engineering. Tickets around EUR 60 student, EUR 200 personal, EUR 250 business. Great for dev-tool, MLOps, and data-infra startups seeking Python adoption and Italian engineering hires.

Prague's premier web and digital technology conference attracting 1,500+ designers, developers, and product managers. Features world-class speakers on UX, frontend, and product development. Tickets range from EUR 200-400, making it one of the best-value tech conferences in Central Europe.

A high-altitude AI conference at the Galaaxy venue above Laax, convening decision-makers from business, politics, and science to shape the Swiss digital agenda. Good for AI founders who want concentrated executive and policymaker access in an intimate setting away from the usual circuit.

Amazon Web Services' free one-day cloud conference at Fiera Milano Rho. Keynotes, technical breakouts, hands-on labs and a partner expo covering generative AI, data, security and serverless for builders, architects and startup founders.

The 14th edition, themed on skills in the AI era, bringing together leaders from education, technology, policy, and business. Strong for founders building in edtech, AI, and the future of work within Romania's biggest regional tech hub.

Switzerland's leading blockchain conference, in its 8th edition at Hochschule Luzern's Rotkreuz campus in the heart of Crypto Valley, gathering builders, investors, policymakers, and researchers. For a web3 founder it offers direct access to the Zug ecosystem of crypto-friendly regulators, funds, and infrastructure providers.

Cyprus's leading technology and startup conference held in Limassol, the island's emerging tech hub. Covers fintech, shipping tech, and SaaS with a focus on Cyprus's advantages as an EU jurisdiction with favorable tax policies. Attracts 1,200+ attendees including founders from the large Eastern European and Israeli expat communities. Tickets from EUR 100-250.

Sofia's leading digital economy conference organized by Capital newspaper, attracting 1,000+ executives, founders, and policymakers. Covers digital transformation, e-commerce, and fintech with a strong focus on the Bulgarian and SEE markets. Tickets around EUR 50-150.

The tenth edition of Split's largest student-facing IT conference, organised by the DUMP association of young programmers. Free to attend, with lectures, workshops, and company booths covering entrepreneurship, AI, and software — a useful recruiting touchpoint for founders hiring in Dalmatia.

Founder-only conference in Warsaw emphasizing candid, off-the-record conversations about the realities of scaling, leadership, and founder psychology. Curated attendance ensures high-trust networking among experienced operators. Valuable for growth-stage Polish founders seeking peer support and honest discussions about the challenges of building companies.

Eleventh edition of southern Italy's flagship innovation fair at Villa Doria d'Angri. Connects startups, universities, research centres and corporates via B2B and R2B speed-dating, with the Innovation Village Award honouring projects aligned to the UN SDGs.

The largest tech and innovation conference in the Baltics, held annually in Vilnius with 4,000+ attendees. Covers startup pitching, fintech, AI, and cybersecurity with international speakers. Tickets range from EUR 100-300, offering strong value for the quality of content and networking.

Deep-tech and innovation conference at the Hofburg Imperial Palace in Vienna, bringing together 2,500+ founders, investors, and corporate innovators. Known for its startup pitch competition, investor matchmaking, and focus on frontier technologies.

International healthtech and biotech conference hosted by Łukasiewicz – PORT, focused on cancer research, diagnostics, and therapy. Relevant for healthtech and biotech founders and researchers seeking R&D partners, clinical collaborators, and exposure to the Łukasiewicz innovation network.

The 11th edition of Turku's flagship business festival for C-level decision-makers, business developers, and growth-company tech leaders, with app-based matchmaking and an evening programme.

A one-day startup festival in Aarhus bringing together 700+ founders, investors, and operators in small, curated, participatory sessions. Hosted by Startup Aarhus, designed for real connections and practical progress beyond traditional panel formats.

Flagship women-led event of Dublin Tech Week at the Mansion House Round Room. Brings together 300+ women founders, investors and ecosystem leaders for keynotes, panels, founder showcases and networking focused on capital access and global growth.