COVID-19 Update: CogX goes virtual for June 8th - 10th

Dear Friends and Colleagues, 

We hope that you and your loved ones are well and staying safe in these uncertain times. I am writing to update you with our thoughts and plans for this year’s CogX. 

The outbreak of COVID-19 has transformed our day-to-day lives as we knew them. All of us have been personally affected, whether by uncertainty or loss, and we are mindful that the weeks and months ahead will continue to present major challenges to us all. Our thoughts are first and foremost with those who are suffering.

Although we have never seen a crisis like this before, it is encouraging to witness communities come together in ways we previously never thought possible.

I want to reassure you of our commitment to the well-being of our community. Your health and safety are of paramount importance to the whole CogX team.

With that said, we strongly believe with the right approach, CogX will be a powerful catalyst to help transform business, government and society. We believe in the power of convening people, whether virtually or in person. And we believe that connecting people helps inspire creativity, drive innovations that improve our quality of life, and to help fully realise human potential.

CogX going ahead June 8th to 10th

As I write this, not only are we being impacted by the unprecedented health emergency, but stand at the onset of what will likely be a painful economic recession. 

While a number of events have been moved to September, which we understand and support, we believe this makes it even more important than ever that we all convene for CogX in June. There are important, and in some cases urgent, topics to discuss: both the immediate challenges presented by COVID-19, and to play our part in helping restart the economy by connecting, collaborating and supporting each other. 

It’s for this reason that this year’s CogX will proceed as planned between Monday June 8th – Wednesday 10th, albeit with some changes to our original thinking. There are three new elements: Virtual CogX, an updated Health agenda, and the Global Leadership Summit – connecting global leadership with technology expertise and the public at scale.

2020 Theme - How do we get the next 10 years right?

Our fourth edition aims to be our biggest, most inclusive and forward-thinking gathering of leaders, CEOs, entrepreneurs, policy makers, artists, academics and activists to date. 

This year we are asking the question, "How do we get the next 10 years right?". Our aims are to:

• Move the conversation forward with concrete actions
• Inspire current and future generations of leaders
• Help reframe the climate emergency as the biggest economic opportunity in the last 200 years 
• Help increase understanding of the current COVID-19 pandemic and champion innovative solutions

CogX 2020’s agenda will achieve these aims by offering the very latest thinking from the brightest minds on the planet across industry, government and academia in 16 parallel topics including: 

• Global Leadership
• Health, Wellbeing, Performance & COVID
• The Planet, Smart-Cities and Space
• Ethics & Society and the Future of Work
• FinTech & Future of Financial Services
• Cyber & Defence
• Industry 4.0 and Sustainable Supply Chains 
• Createch - Culture, Creativity and Technology
• The Cutting Edge
• Lab to Live - real world lessons
• The HR and Ed Tech Revolution 
• Start-up to Scale Up to IPO and Beyond
• Web 3.0 
• Research – The Long View
• Gen Z 
• Next Gen Infrastructure & Cloud Services

Do let us know if you are interested in partnering on any one of these.

CogX is Going Virtual

Necessity is teaching the world how to work remotely and interact through technology right now and we see this as a moment for embracing the opportunities technology gives us to connect. The more we thought about it, the more it seemed imperative to open CogX up and ensure that people are able to take part regardless of where they are in the world.

We are creating a comprehensive Virtual CogX experience for you that aims to set the standard for what a digital event should be. All of our team’s efforts, creativity, and attention to detail will be focused on making sure everything works perfectly and we can’t wait for you to experience it.

All 16 topics will be streamed online, and the virtual format will also include virtual meet-the-speaker breakout Q&A sessions where attendees will be able to put their questions directly to our world-leading experts. 

We will host an interactive vExpo, virtual start-up village, and brand new side events tailored to all kinds of specific interests such as roundtables and workshops delivered by our partners.

And it wouldn’t be CogX if you didn’t make brilliant new connections. Our world-class app and new meeting maker service will be powering three days of networking, which will enable all participants to reconnect with people they know, and build completely new relationships. 

We are all really excited about how this new format will make CogX accessible to a much bigger, national and global audience, and for the first time instantly jump from one topic to another as you explore and seek out the best sessions for you at any moment in time.

Updated Health Agenda

Anyone who has previously attended CogX will know that our Health programme is one of our strongest tracks. We first introduced a dedicated health stage in 2018 with extraordinary speakers such as Matthew Gould (CEO of NHSX), Mary Lou Jepsen (CEO & Founder, Openwater) and the Secretary of State for Health, Matt Hancock, who has spoken at all three previous editions of CogX.  

With this global health emergency, we are more conscious than ever of the need to facilitate conversations that will drive us forward. It is a time to work together to explore what technology and policies will make a difference, and get behind them. 

As such our Health agenda will be updated to have a clear focus on the critical and urgent issues surrounding the global COVID-19 pandemic: the lessons learned, challenges ahead, opportunities to reduce suffering and save lives, what solutions are available and what’s coming next. 

The Global Leadership Summit 

At times like these, leadership matters more than ever.

In its founding year, 2017, CogX’s mission was bringing clarity to the complex world of AI, accelerating adoption while ensuring safe and responsible deployment and that the benefits flow through to us all. Over the last three years we have grown exponentially and expanded in scope beyond AI to Web 3.0, breakthrough technologies from plastics to genetics, and to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. And this year we are expanding our scope again.

The idea behind the Global Leadership Summit emerged when we first began planning this year’s event and settled on a core theme: ‘How can we get the next 10 years right?”. It seemed important then, but it’s clearly more poignant now than ever. 

The Summit will run concurrently with the main CogX agenda bringing together over 4,500 of leaders around a programme of online virtual activities including: the Leaders Lounge for peer networking, Chatham House Rule talks, exclusive side events, executive workshops and our new appointment setting concierge service. To make the most of their time at CogX, our team can optionally upgrade and have our meetings team pre-organise meetings before the event.  

Physical Event

As of today, the physical event has not yet been cancelled.

We felt strongly that if it was possible to hold an event we should, as there is still unique value in a physical in-person meeting. So, we shall wait until May 8th when we will take government’s current advice on which part, if any, of the physical event can or should go ahead. If it does CogX would run as a Hybrid event with both a virtual and physical in-person experience. 

Tickets

We have a range of options fit for any need ranging from ￡45 to ￡4995. You can find out more about ticket types and prices at: cogx.co/tickets/.

Opportunities for you to get involved in 2020:

1,000 Complimentary Festival Passes – From now until April 3rd, we are offering 1,000 free standard Festival passes, normally ￡295. You can upgrade this pass at a later date and benefit from a ￡295 discount on any other pass.

Passes for Health Workers – I’m proud to confirm that we are providing up to 10,000 complimentary Topic Priority passes for public health workers from any country across the globe, as well 75% off any other pass. 

Startups, Academics and Government – As always we are committed to subsidising passes for the Founders and CEOs of Startups, Government, Academics and NGOs – we think it’s important you’re part of the conversation. 

Speaking Opportunities and Awards – We are still taking submissions, so don’t miss the chance to submit now.

Sponsoring, Exhibiting and Partnering – Finally, if you are interested in becoming part of CogX, whether it is for a specific topic, the virtual expo, side event or product launch – we would love to help you achieve your goals. There are limited places left, so please get in touch as soon as possible.

We very much look forward to welcoming you and your team to CogX, June 2020. If there is anything we can do to support you and your business in the coming weeks, please lean in and let us know.

Best, 

Charlie

Founder & CEO 

CogX Festival and CognitionX Knowledge Platform