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Some all-stars coming to this year's DEMO conference, Sept 21-23

demo_alumni_awarddemo_alumn_21Over the next few days, I’ll be talking here a little more about the exciting program we have in store for DEMO, next month’s technology conference in San Diego.

For starters, we’ve invited a number of legendary alumni entrepreneurs back to the DEMO stage. Each of 16 individuals will join me and Co-Executive Producer Chris Shipley on stage in an interactive town hall open format. They include some of the biggest tech rock stars to have launched on the DEMO stage in the past 13 years — the era during which Chris Shipley has produced the event.

DEMO attendees will get to hear from and pose questions to them. The alumni will also each be presented with a “Lifetime Achieve Award” for their significant contribution to the advancement of technology. This is all in honor of Chris’ final conference. Chris has evaluated more than 20,000 applications to select 1,500 leading edge companies to launch. (As reported earlier, I’m co-producing this fall’s conference with Chris, but will be taking over as executive producer afterward.)

All the fun is happening on Sept 21-23. Buy your ticket here.

June 5th: The AI Audit in NYC

Join us next week in NYC to engage with top executive leaders, delving into strategies for auditing AI models to ensure fairness, optimal performance, and ethical compliance across diverse organizations. Secure your attendance for this exclusive invite-only event.

Here are the alumni we’ve invited:

  • Shai Agassi, Founder & CEO, Better Place (DEMO Debut: TopTier, 1997)
  • Colin Angle, Chairman of the Board, CEO & Co-Founder, iRobot (DEMO Debut: iRobot, 2000)
  • Helen Grenier, CEO of Droid Works, Inc. (DEMO Debut: iRobot, 2000)
  • Ed Colligan, Former President and CEO, Palm, Inc. (DEMO Debut: Palm, Inc., 1996)
  • Donna Dubinsky, Founder, CEO & Board Chair, Numenta (DEMO Debut: Palm, Inc., 1996)
  • Jeff Hawkins, Founder, Numenta (DEMO Debut: Palm, Inc., 1996)
  • Marc Benioff, Founder & Chairman, Salesforce.com (DEMO Debut: Salesforce.com, 2000)
  • Mike Cassidy, Co-Founder & CEO, Ruba, Xfire, Direct Hit, and Stylus Innovation (DEMO Debut: Xfire, 2005)
  • Diane Greene, Entrepreneur, Founder and Former CEO, VMware (DEMO Debut: VMware, 1999)
  • Subrah Iyar, Founder & “former” CEO, WebEx (DEMO Debut: WebEx, 1999)
  • Keng Lim, Founder, Chairman & CEO, NextLabs (DEMO Debut: Kiva, 1997)
  • Kevin Lynch, CTO, Senior VP, Experience & Technology Organization, Adobe Systems (DEMO Debut: Adobe Systems (for Air/Flex), 2007)
  • Teresa Meng, Reid Weaver Dennis Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Stanford University (DEMO Debut: Atheros Communciations, 1999)
  • Andy Rubin, Vice President, Engineering, Google (DEMO Debut: Danger Research, 2001)
  • Ben Trott, Founder & CTO, Six Apart (DEMO Debut: Six Apart, 2004)
  • Mena Trott, Founder & President, Six Apart (DEMO Debut: Six Apart, 2004)

It may be tough economic times, but true entrepreneurs are relentless — they keep driving their businesses even when VCs aren’t giving them money and everyone else is giving up hope.

Nowhere is this reflected more than in the incoming class of 60 new companies at DEMO next month. It’ll be great to have these alumni on hand for inspiration.

Come see the most promising new technologies unveiled for the first very time at DEMOfall 09 this September 21-23 in San Diego. VentureBeat readers may register to attend the conference at a special 20% discount off our regular rate. Register now at: http://www.demo.com/f9vb2