The Glendale Tech Week, now in its eighth year, kicks off on Sept. 12. The three-day event serves as a platform for tech companies and startups to showcase their ideas and products during a series of panel discussions and presentations.
The event is an initiative led by the City of Glendale’s Economic Development Division and features a job fair and pitch competition. Local tech accelerator and startup hub Hero House, which is owned by venture capital firm SmartGateVC and partially funded by the city, is a partnering sponsor of Glendale Tech Week.
Glendale is home to 1,500 tech companies, city officials said, which employ more than 20,000 people. More than 800 local and regional attendees attended Glendale Tech Week last year. Companies participating this year include Glendale-based enterprises Britive Inc., Dot818 LLC and Phonexa.
Soua Vang, Glendale’s deputy director of Economic Development, said the event’s goal is to bring innovators, startups, executives, angel investors and venture capitalists together in order to build the tech industry in Glendale and in the greater Los Angeles area.
“We hear from so many of the companies and individuals who participate each year that the opportunity to come together for these events, panels and the informal networking gives them a unique opportunity to meet potential investors, partners and collaborators,” Vang said. “It’s a real differentiator in their overall success.”
This year’s event series begins on Sept. 12 with a job fair hosted by the city-sponsored Verdugo Job Center that will be attended by employers from Cisco Systems Inc., the California Institute of Technology and CSG International, among others. Phonexa, a marketing automation platform, is hosting a “Women in Tech” panel the next day for the second year and is a main sponsor of the event series. The Women in Tech panel will feature Phonexa’s chief marketing officer, Talar Malakian, along with speakers from Nike Inc.’s Nike Virtual Studios, artificial-intelligence powered marketing service Influential and Adweek.
“We realize that in order for an emerging event like Glendale Tech Week and startups alike who are participating to be successful, they need to have appropriate resources and a strong supporting foundation,” Phonexa Chief Executive Lilit Davtyan said. “We hope the Glendale tech scene and the community alike are inspired by the weeklong events and conversations in order to continue on their quest of tech innovation.”
Artyom Poghosyan, founder and chief executive of cloud security platform Britive, will serve as keynote speaker at the “Demo Day & PitchFest” event. PitchFest, which allows early-stage startups to pitch their businesses to potential investors in a “Shark Tank” fashion, will take place on Sept. 14 at Glendale Community College. Venture capitalists and investors in attendance will include partners from Almaz Capital, Headline and Glendale-based Oceanview Capital Partners Inc.
Panels from Hero House will include a few new topics, such as business negotiation techniques and the financial implications of AI and machine learning. Vang said that in addition to recurring events such as the Women in Tech panel and PitchFest, this year’s Glendale Tech Week is adding opportunities for younger attendees to get involved. These include a “Little Engineers and Parents” event taking place on the first day at the Armenian Society of Los Angeles and a chess tournament hosted by Dot818.
“Glendale and this region have the right elements for success in a diverse number of tech sectors and Glendale Tech Week helps us to celebrate and build upon that success,” Vang said.