Last Dublin Web Summit expected to attract 30,000 attendees

The Web Summit is taking place for the final time in Dublin this week before the tech conference’s departure for Lisbon, Portugal.

More than 30,000 attendees are expected to attend, including 1,000 investors, 800 journalists and 2,000 start-ups from around the world. There will be 21 side-summits taking place, including a start-up summit, an investor summit, an accelerator summit, a data summit, a code summit and a music summit.

Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger, Pixar Animation Studios president Ed Catmull, Slack chief executive Stewart Butterfield, Gilt chief executive Michelle Peluso, Tinder co-founder Sean Rad, CSI: Cyber producer Mary Aiken, and Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code, will attend.

Krieger will be discussing his vision for the second largest social media platform in the world, while Butterfield will talk about his platform, and how it may one day kill off email.

Facebook CEO Mike Schroepfer will share how high-altitude drones, laser communications systems, AI and VR are being used to connect more than a billion people.

The tech conference will host a careers event on Wednesday evening, where 100 students will be invited on stage to ring the closing bell of the Nasdaq stock market.

Coinciding with the Web Summit, National Digital Week is also taking place this week. The event, organised by not-for-profit digital hub Ludgate@Skibbereen, is taking place in Co Cork, and will provide practical sessions on the latest technology trends and give advice on growing a business using digital technologies.

Companies presenting at National Digital Week include Discovery Networks, PayPal, Vodafone, Intel, Musgrave Group, AIB, Glen Dimplex and Microsoft.

Key speakers include head of Google Ireland Ronan Harris, Dr Laurence O’Rourke, lead co-ordinator for the European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission, and Ingrid Vanderveldt of the US-based Empowering a Billion Women by 2020 organisation, who is also a former entrepreneur in residence at Dell, and a CNBC television host.

This weekend will see a number of entrepreneurs, investors and techies, including Microsoft executive vice-president Peggy Johnston, AdRoll CMO Adam Berke and Brinc co-founder Bay McLaughlin, head to Sligo for the Surf Summit, a spin-off of the Web Summit.

Professional surfers Garret McNamara, Easkey Britton and Pauline Ado will all speak at the Surf Summit, and a number of activities will be put on for attendees including surfing, hiking, paddle-boarding and mountain biking.