Connecting investors with the next generation of event industry businesses, IBTM Ignite will return to IBTM World 2026, combining investment-ready support, live pitching and structured introductions to help emerging companies turn promising ideas into commercial opportunities.
Delivered in
partnership with growth consultancy and M&A specialist allpoints, the
programme has helped participating businesses secure £3.5 million ($4.7
million) in investment to date.
Among the 30 qualified
start-ups taking part this year are Gianluca Sordano, CEO and Co-Founder of
Always Friday, and Shelby Crisan, Founder of KNO Events, who shared their views
on the programme and its potential to support the future growth of their businesses.
Solving industry
challenges
Sordano said: “The
events industry is changing quickly, but the way corporate events are planned
and delivered has not changed at the same pace. We started Always Friday to
change that. We combine technology, AI and event expertise to make the whole
process much faster. The goal is to make organising a corporate event feel as
simple and fast as using any other modern service.”
Crisan added: “I think
the events industry is at an inflection point. We’ve become incredibly
sophisticated in what we create for attendees, but behind the scenes, teams are
still running multimillion-dollar events with spreadsheets, email chains and
systems that don’t talk to each other. After 20 years producing events, I built
KNO Events because I believe the operational side of our industry deserves
better.”
The elevator pitch
“The idea is simple,”
says Gianluca. “A company should be able to tell us what it needs and get to a
finished event much faster than it can today. They can use Always Friday as a
self-service platform or have our team take care of the event from start to
finish. Behind both experiences, AI handles a large part of the work involved
in researching options, managing requests, coordinating people and moving the
event forward.
“We are also working
on the other side of the market. We help venues identify and act on the
opportunities that fit them, while giving them a way to benefit from requests
they cannot take themselves.”
Shelby says: “We’re
building the infrastructure underneath the event where the real, constantly
changing operational data lives across budgets, room blocks, F&B,
contracted spaces, vendors and more.” The platform gives planners an overview
of their entire event portfolio, which she describes as “adding a teammate who
knows every detail of every event, understands what needs your attention next,
and can help you figure out what to do about it.”
A space to flourish
IBTM World will mark
the first public demonstration of Always Friday, giving the company an
opportunity to meet potential partners and establish new industry connections.
“It is difficult for a
young company to build relationships across an established industry from
scratch,” he says. “Programmes like Ignite shorten that distance. They put
founders in the room with investors and industry leaders who would otherwise
take much longer to reach."
For Shelby, the
opportunity to gain feedback and build relationships is equally important.
“As a founder, you
become incredibly close to what you’re building. Of course, we’re excited about
the potential for investment, but I’m just as interested in the relationships
and perspectives that come from the programme. One introduction can lead to a
customer, partnership, investor or an entirely new opportunity. At this stage,
those conversations can genuinely change our trajectory.”
She added: “Some of
the best ideas come from people who have spent years thinking, ‘There has to be
a better way to do this.’ But having a great idea and building a scalable
company around it are very different things,” says Shelby. “Programmes like
Ignite help bridge that gap by connecting founders with customers, mentors,
visibility and capital. If we want more innovation in events, we can’t just
celebrate new ideas once they’re successful, we have to create opportunities
for early ideas to become successful.”
Access to
investment
More than 15 investors
are expected to attend IBTM Ignite, bringing experience, networks and
investment insight to the selected businesses.
“Investment gives a
company the ability to move faster,” says Gianluca. “But the people behind that
investment can be just as important. For Always Friday, we are building in a
large market with a lot of complexity. Investors who understand technology, marketplaces
and service businesses can help us make better decisions as we scale.”
Shelby agrees: “Access
to investment can completely change the speed at which a company moves.
Founders are constantly making trade-offs. Do we build this feature or that
one? Hire this person or wait? Enter this market now or next year? Investment
can turn some of those ‘or’ decisions into ‘and’.
“But access matters
too. Investors force you to zoom out from the next feature or customer and
answer a much bigger question: how big could this become?”
Claire Grecian,
Founder and CEO of Circle Agency and one of the participating investors, said:
“Our industry thrives on fresh thinking, and the best new ideas deserve a real
route to capital, mentorship and profile. That's why I wanted to be part of
IBTM Ignite. I'm keen to meet founders reinventing how we connect people at
events and how we measure what live experiences really deliver. AI will be a
big part of that, from smarter planning and operations to making events bolder,
more personalised, accessible and generally more innovative, but always in
service of why we're there in the first place: being together, in person.”
An opportunity to
hone the pitch
Selected Ignite
founders will receive investment-readiness training before presenting their
businesses live on IBTM World's Future Stage, where investors and audiences
will have the opportunity to respond and provide feedback.
“When you are building
something that changes an established process, you have to be able to explain
it simply,” says Gianluca. “Preparing the pitch forces us to be very clear
about the problem we are solving, why the timing is right and what we have learned
from our customers so far. Then comes the part I find most valuable: hearing
the questions. If an investor, venue operator or event professional sees
something differently from us, that is useful. Those conversations can change
how we think about the product and where we take the company next.”
Shelby says: “I know
the event industry and the operational problems because I’ve lived them. I also
have a very clear vision for what KNO Events will become. Having people
challenge how we communicate the opportunity and the bigger vision for KNO
Events and then being able to take that story directly to investors, is
incredibly valuable.”
A unique industry
platform
For Gianluca, IBTM
Ignite offers an opportunity to position Always Friday within the meetings and
events industry.
“IBTM World brings
together the people who make the industry work, from corporate buyers and
venues to agencies, suppliers and technology companies. That is exactly where
we want to be. We already have customers using Always Friday for their events,
so IBTM Ignite is a chance to show a model that is already being tested in the
real world.”
Shelby added: “Ignite
adds another important layer by bringing investors into that conversation. It
creates this rare intersection of people who experience the problem, people
building new solutions and people who can help those solutions scale. For a company
trying to fundamentally change how event teams work, that’s exactly where I
want KNO Events to be.”
IBTM Ignite will run across all three days of IBTM World 2026, taking place from November 17 to 19 at Fira Gran Via in Barcelona. -TradeArabia News Service