even before the first Web Summit in Brazil, scheduled for May this year, Paddy Cosgrave has just confirmed that the entrepreneurship event will take place in the Middle East as early as 2024. Qatar is the chosen country.
The idea of internationalizing the Web Summit had already been explained by Paddy Cosgrave, with the guarantee that this does not mischaracterize the conference and exhibition of entrepreneurship and technology, which left Ireland for Lisbon in 2016 and will remain in Portugal until 2028, in an agreement with the Government and the City of Lisbon for 10 years.
Paddy Cosgrave confirmed on Twitter that the first WebSummit in the middle east will take place in Qatar in March 2024.
🚨 A little announcement 🚨
This little Irish company will host it's first Web Summit in the Middle East in Qatar in March 2024
In recent years almost every Middle Eastern country and near neighbor has been an active participant and partner at our events. Those countries have…
— Paddy Cosgrave (@paddycosgrave) April 6, 2023
"This small Irish company will host its first Middle East Web Summit in Qatar in March 2024“, explains the CEO of the Web Summit in a tweet, adding that “in recent years, almost all countries in the Middle East and close neighbors have been active participants and partners in our events. These countries include Saudi Arabia, Palestine, Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Turkey, Iran, Israel and Bahrain. Several of its political leaders have spoken at our events, most recently Queen Rania of Jordan in November in Lisbon".
BUT: Participation of Angolan startups in the Web Summit considered “excellent”
For the entrepreneur and creator of the Web Summit, “the number of startups and entrepreneurs from the region that travel annually to Lisbon for the Web Summit has grown exponentially. The time is right for a Web Summit in the Middle East and we look forward to welcoming participants and speakers from around the world to Qatar in March 2024".
The creation of what Paddy Cosgrave calls “regional events” of the Web Summit was involved in controversy, but the entrepreneur has always been excellent in putting the issue aside, and in ensuring that all initiatives benefit the annual event, in Lisbon, which in 2023 is scheduled for a week later than usual, from the 13th to the 16th of November.
The announcement of the Web Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 2023 may have caught many by surprise, but Paddy Cosgrave guarantees that it is also positive for Lisbon, saying that there have never been so many Brazilian startups and participants from Brazil in the city. “Many companies see Portugal as a gateway to Europe”, he underlined in the interview with SAPO TEK.
"Technology is global and most of the people who come to the Web Summit are from Europe and the US, and we want to make the event more global.”, he said, recalling that there were talks with Japan and the city of Tokyo, even before the COVID-19 pandemic, and that he does not know if this line will be resumed before 2024/25. “At that time maybe we will do something in the Middle East and Africa, we are working hard to find the best location before we share the news”He added.
Confirmation for the approach to the Middle East in March 2024, a date that is strangely close to the one chosen for Rio de Janeiro. The first Web Summit outside Europe is scheduled for Brazil, and the city of Rio de Janeiro, and will take place from the 1st to the 4th of May.
The Web Summit started in Dublin in 2009, where it lasted for 5 years. In 2016 it moved to Lisbon, highlighting the advantages of the Portuguese city, and in 2018 the organization signed a contract guaranteeing permanence in Lisbon for 10 years, with the support of the Government and the city of Lisbon of annual investments of 11 million euros. Of this amount, 3 million euros are municipal investments and 8 million are guaranteed by the Government.
In addition to the Web Summit, Paddy Cosgrave's company organizes other international entrepreneurship events such as Collision in Toronto, Canada, RISE in Hong Kong, the Corporate Innovation Summit and Venture, both in Lisbon.
