4YFN 2016 Recap – The Best And Biggest So Far

The week came and went in a second, the event we all had been looking forward to for a year, is now only a memory, and we have to start looking forward to next year.

12,000 visitors, 450 startups and tons of great keynotes, competitions, party’s and so much more!

To those of you that were not lucky enough to participate, here is a review of the three days.

Monday – Disrupted by mobile:

The show started with a speach by chairman of 4YFN and VC Yossi Vardi and MWC head Aleix Valls.

Panel with 4YFN chairman Yossi Vardi, Scott Mackin (Barcinno), Imma Martinez (Preadly), Mario Tapia (Mobile Monday) and Anselm Bossacona (Catalonia Trade and Investment).

How mobile technology is changing how we live our lives and how we do business was the red line through all the keynotes, fireside chats and panels. Companies like Facebook, Indiegogo, Fever, Chartboost, Airbnb, Ouishare, (I could go on forever) shared their thoughts and experience on the topic.

On top of this there were also 13 different workshops exploring the topic from different perspectives.

Then it was time for the first 4YFN award, where eight finalist pitched their idea in front of an expert panel. The startup Thingthing had the best pitch and won the first of the three awards of the week.

The day ended with a live-stream of Mark Zuckerberg keynote from the Mobile World Congress on the other side of town.

Luckily, Barcinno was there: Zuckerberg defended Apple At The MWC16: “We believe in encryption”

Tuesday – Internet of things :

Day two drew even more people to the event, and the huge hall was buzzing from morning to night from all

Slock.it was the big winner of the 4YFN IoT awards

the pitches and connections being made.

IoT has the last years become one of the hottest topics of discussion in the tech world. As technology develops faster and prices on software/hardware is decreasing dramatically, this gives entrepreneurs new possibilities to build great products, without tons of money.

Also the second day brought us interesting panels, keynotes and fireside chats from companies as Intel, IBM, Hackcradle, ICANN, FoutyTwo, WeGoCity, Amazon, The Next Web and many, many more.

Tuesday was also very much about startup hubs and city’s as well as IoT. Several different panels discussed the different major hubs in Europe and what makes a city a startup hub.

Scott Mackin introduced Barcelona as one of Europe’s fastest growing startup hubs.

The winner of the 4YFN Internet of Things award was Slock.it. You can read about how they won and a description of all the other startups here: Slock.it Is The BIG IoT Winner At 4YFN

Wednesday – digital media:

The last day at 4YFN was all about digital media. An extremely important topic, because of how the old traditional media industry is changing dramatically, and because of how everything is going online, and creates massive possibilities for entrepreneurs with groundbreaking ideas.

Both Facebook and Twitter talked about their role in the changing media landscape, and the hot topic of advertising and Adblock was also on the agenda multiple times during the day.

Pixoneye from Israel won the last of the three 4YFN awards for digital media startups.

A smaller, but interesting event happening on Wednesday, was at the Telefonica Open Future_ stand, where representatives from most big cities in Europe presented their startup ecosystems, and why you should join.

Our own editor at large, Scott Mackin, won over many new souls to the belief that Barcelona is a great hub for startups. Even though he also talked about the downsides of building your company here, he also inspired the audience on how the ecosystem is expanding and improving continuously.

The winner of the last 4YFN award, and beating maybe the most impressive set of startups of the three awards, was Pixoneye. All about the last award and the other companies can be found here: Pixoneye Takes Home The Digital Media Award At 4YFN 2016

See you next year!