Factory Berlin

For most of us online privacy is an afterthought, but for hackers, it’s a means of survival. In this Coffee Talks session, we’ll be sitting down with a hacker to hear insights and lessons on how and why safeguarding ourselves online has never been more important. Speaker Description: Fionnbharr has worn many hats, from exploit developer to leading red teams. Most recently, leaning on his eight years university teaching experience, he has been focusing on evolving the way computer security is taught online with his stealth mode startup. He occasionally competes in hacking competitions, known as CTFs, with the 9447 crew, including the finals at DEFCON in Las Vegas and SECUInside in Seoul. He is widely considered the second most attractive hacker in Australia.

Empathy has been cast aside for years as a soft skill that made people too compassionate to deliver results in the business world. What does it mean to be empathetic in a business context? What has changed in society and economy that has propelled empathy to new ‘buzzword heights’? What does it mean for a company to apply empathy as a strategic competitive advantage? Join us to discuss and reflect on the new age of empathy. Tatiana Martins is the co-founder of Empathy Lab a Brazil-based international consultancy agency in the field of strategic empathy. She has traveled to China, Indonesia, Germany, Brazil, and Argentina helping companies such as SC Johnson, Unilever, Pernod Ricard, Microsoft among others to understand their users and employees across the globe. With a background of 10 years as FMGC marketing executive and Design Thinking coach, she has found her passion transforming companies through the power of empathy.

In this Coffee Talks session, we discuss the details of brand design and web design and even (believe me) eyebrow design. But the one thing we do every single day, all day long, and yet nobody discusses, is conversation design. Certain conversations can stay imprinted in our minds forever, provoke specific feelings, or even alter the ways in which we do things. Is it hard to have a conversation of this caliber? Or are we merely not optimising our discussions? Join us for a talk about safe spaces, weird questions, followed by live networking and a demonstration of jojojo, the personality exploration card game.

Happiness is a lot of small things done well, day by day. We all know best what makes us happy but intellectualising gets us nowhere. It’s a matter of following our interests persistently that makes all the difference. Adam and Amelia sat down with us to discuss how happiness is a build-up of multiple activities across the physical, mental and social levels. Adam and Amelia co-founded Workout for Happiness (WfH) during their personal search for true happiness. This journey began with their philosophy and cultural studies backgrounds, which then led them to the world of insight meditation. In 2008, Adam lived in and managed a Vipassana meditation center for one year and Amelia has been meditating since 2010. The more they looked, the more they understood, it’s the little things.

One of the most shared and destructive thought habits most entrepreneurs encounter is perfectionism. At this Coffee Talks session, we explore the difference between striving for excellence (a trait that can empower you) and struggling with perfectionism (a trait that will prevent you from achieving your potential). Ela Crain is a writer and a coach. She has an MSc in Decision Making Sciences from University College London. She has founded and managed a video production company in London, and a Webby nominee non-profit organization, called Mash Stories—listed among the Top 50 Websites in 2015. She’s published three books, just finished her first novel, and is currently giving workshops to help young entrepreneurs overcome their dysfunctional patterns, and unleash their true potential.

Onefootball CEO & Founder Lucas von Cranach in joins us for a Fireside Chat at Factory Berlin. Since its conception in 2008, Onefootball has created a global community of over 25 million fans scattered across 200 countries. It allows users to not only keep up to date with stats and scores but, enables them to view video content and keep up with the highlights that are important to them. Join us as we chat to Lucas about his personal entrepreneurial journey, the companies mission and, their place in the future.

So we’ve innovated our way to unbelievable levels of productivity. At times, we’re obsessed with productivity hacks and personal development to the point of mental breakdown. Flux Co-Founder, Jim Ralley joins us for a morning coffee and chat to discuss why creating space is the serendipity machine. And laziness is its fuel.

Clue Co-Founder & CEO Ida Tin joins us for a chat, and shares how they've turned personal health data into global insight. Clue is a period tracking and fertility app, launched in 2013 with the mission to empower women on a global scale. Over the last 4 years, the app has amassed millions of active users in over 190 countries, and become one of the most popular “Health & Fitness” apps in the United States, Germany, France and many other countries. Listen to Ida discuss Clue’s mission & growth, femtech and the next trends in health tracking.

We talked to Tom Pitfield, the digital mastermind behind Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and President of Canada’s leading progressive think tank. Hear the full story behind Justin Trudeau’s digital success and learn about the key takeaways that can be applied to any modern digital political campaign!

German serial entrepreneur, investor and TV personality, Frank Thelen joins us for a Fireside Chat at Factory Berlin. Frank has over two decades of experience in founding and investing in disruptive businesses in Germany. As the Founder and CEO of e42, he focuses on seed and early-stage investments like Wunderlist, myTaxi, kaufDA and Little Lunch. In 2014, Frank joined Sony Pictures prime-time TV show “Shark Tank”, broadcasted in Germany on VOX as “Die Höhle der Löwen”.

Venture Capital is clearly the main source of financing for startups. The rising availability of capital has led to a prospering startup ecosystem but also has some questionable implications which are rarely discussed. In the current setup many founders feel more incentivised to run after the next, bigger financing round rather than building a sustainable business. Atlantic Labs Partner Jens-Philipp Klein joins us to discuss why in some cases, the VC industry stunts innovation rather than supporting it, and what startups should know when pursuing financing.

For some companies, brands are a natural manifestation of their vision, mission and values, for others it’s a tool to market and sell their products. In today’s landscape, consumers are more alert than ever to inauthentic brands and even vindictive towards those they disagree with. unu founder and CXO Elias Atahi joins us for a chat to explain how a real brand dictates your culture, products, communication and basically everything else you do in your company.

Google Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist, Vint Cerf joins us for a Fireside Chat at Factory. Cerf, who is widely known as one of the “Fathers of the Internet”, helped co-invent some of its standards and underlying technologies. Moderated by Gründerszene editor in chief Frank Schmiechen, Cerf chats about the early days of the Internet and how he has contributed to global policy development promoting its continued spread.

A life-long entrepreneur, Nathan Blecharczyk discusses his journey from founding his first company as a teenager to developing Airbnb to the the world’s largest community-driven hospitality company. He also touches on the recent launch of Trips, the most significant development in Airbnb’s eight-year history.

We welcomed the four EyeEm co-founders for a Fireside Chat at Factory to discuss how they built a global photography community and marketplace with over 20 million photographers and 80M photos from Berlin, and how they use new technologies, like AI to find the best images to license to brands, agencies and individuals.

Is remote work anything more than just startup hype? We sit down with Rachel diCerbo, one of the early adopters of this model and manager of remote teams for Wikimedia Foundation and Couchsurfing to discuss the history and future of remote work.

Natalie Barnet joins us from AYEKA, one of Tel Aviv's leading shared workspaces. We discuss the shift from offices to this new model of working and whether millennials really need a pool in their office.

From their humble beginnings in Sweden to a global headquarters right here at Factory, Soundcloud founders Alex Ljung and Eric Wahlforss discuss their journey to the top of the music streaming industry.

Digital Director of the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, Jenna Lowenstein opens up about the latest tools, technologies and the role of social media in digital campaigning, as well as her learnings and experiences from the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

We sat down with Greg Corrado to pull back the curtain on the future of machine intelligence. Hear from one of the leading minds on what we can expect from AI in the next decades and the challenges Google is overcoming to turn those into reality.