This May will be a huge month in the tech calendar, with multiple events taking place worldwide. Some offer rewards, others, opportunities to network, learn, and boost brand awareness.
Unsure about what they are and which to attend? We've written this article to help you decide.
From learning from "the godfather of AI" to pitching to VCs on a sunny beach, we cover 10 events you can't miss, whether you work in AI, fintech, cleantech, or otherwise.
Computing is often regarded as one of the leading tech publications, specialising in enterprise IT, cybersecurity, data and analytics, and tech leadership news.
On November 25th, the publication is hosting its Women in Tech Excellence Awards in London.
Since launching in 2017, the awards annually celebrate the achievements of women in the tech sector across various categories, from emerging talent to established leaders.
Key categories include:
Problem Solver of the Year
Founder/Entrepreneur of the Year
Graduate of the Year/Apprentice of the Year
Woman of the Year
Research shows that 68% of businesses report better brand recognition after receiving awards. For female leaders who are often a minority, the impact of a reward is possibly higher.
Female winners not only stand out better but also pave the way for new partnerships, collaborations, and even investment to supercharge their company’s growth.
Meanwhile, rising stars gain greater recognition for their hard work, strengthening their personal brand and improving their career prospects.
With the Women in Tech Excellence Awards being so well recognised, there are few better awards to apply for.
The entry deadline is the 2nd of May, with requirements here.
Turing Fest, named after the renowned mathematician and scientist Alan Turing, is a huge highlight in the European tech calendar.
Each year, founders, engineering leaders, and investors convene in the heart of Edinburgh to learn, network, and shape the future of tech.
This 10th edition is packed with keynotes, roundtables, and networking sessions featuring 40+ speakers and 100+ investors.
Key highlights from the agenda include:
How LLMs transformed text to autonomous action
How to build a revenue strategy that differentiates in a crowded market
Surviving the future: Innovation & leadership in the age of chaos
The VC - founder relationship sucks - how do we fix it?
Since Turing Fest brings together a mix of professionals specialising across product design, engineering, growth, and leadership, it promises a richer mix of ideas and strategies typically found at other, more siloed, tech conferences.
Moreover, since the conference is held in Edinburgh, the perspectives shared are largely European, a far cry from other Silicon Valley-centric events.
As such, many of the conversations are likely to focus on how Europe can prevent its best talent from flocking to the US, which has become a huge challenge in recent years.
With 2025 speakers including Paul Adams (Chief Product Officer at Intercom), Colin Jarvis (Head of Forward Deployed Engineering at OpenAI), and Jonny Brooks-Bartlett (Senior Machine Learning Engineer at Spotify), attendees are in excellent hands to navigate current challenges.
Tickets with varying levels of access can be found here.
For the first time, POLITICO is bringing its AI & Tech Summit to London, where leading policymakers, industry experts, and innovators will convene to address pressing challenges in AI and technology.
Key topics to be debated include AI governance, security, sustainability, and global competitiveness, with a particular emphasis on how future policies in the UK should be shaped.
Since much of the conversation is expected to centre on how the UK can balance rapid technological advancement with ethical oversight, public trust, and economic growth, it’s a timely opportunity for attendees to hear from industry leaders.
But more importantly, attendees can network with journalists who will be covering these issues heavily in the coming months, in addition to potential partners.
Alternatively, tech leaders can use what they learn to make better-informed decisions about how they shape their own AI strategies, ensuring they align with new regulations, while giving them an edge over their competition.
You can register for the summit here.
No, a sister event held in Brussels is also taking place between the 13th and 14th of May.
This summit, now in its 8th edition, gathers EU policymakers, industry leaders, and tech innovators to discuss the likes of the EU's newly introduced AI Act, aiming to foster innovation while ensuring regulatory compliance.
Case-in-point, it offers attendees a more in-depth look at how they can anticipate, adapt to, and influence the regulatory landscape across the continent.
Notable speakers at the Brussels summit include Yoshua Bengio (professor and deep learning pioneer), Cristina Caffarra (renowned economist and expert in competition policy), and Bart Groothuis MEP (a key voice in EU cybersecurity and digital regulation).
You can register here.
TechCrunch, the leading global tech publication, is hosting its StrictlyVC event in London to bring together top investors and entrepreneurs to drive innovation.
Previous editions have included interviews with Sam Altman (Open AI) and Hans Tung (GGV Capital), highlighting the event's reputation among the tech and VC communities.
This year, TS Anil (CEO at Monzo Bank), Sonali De Rycker (Partner at Accel), and Nazo Moosa (Managing Director at Paladin) will appear for key discussions.
For founders, this event offers an invaluable opportunity to understand what leading investors are really looking for in the current climate, what sectors are catching their attention, and how to stand out in a competitive funding landscape.
For investors, the event offers direct access to high-potential entrepreneurs and a way to stay ahead of emerging trends.
Considering most of TechCrunch’s events are held in the US, it's also one of the few occasions European-based attendees can interact with the calibre of leaders the publication attracts.
Tickets are expected to sell out quickly. You can register here.
Held in Austin, Texas, Consensus is one of the largest and most influential gatherings in the tech world.
It was recently touted by Forbes as “The Super Bowl of Blockchain, the World Cup of Web3”.
Given the event’s significance, speakers, including Eric Trump (Executive Vice President of The Trump Organisation) and Robert Hines (Executive Director of the President’s Council of Advisors for Digital Assets), will drum up the future of digital assets and decentralized technologies globally.
As such, over 20k people are expected to attend, from up-and-coming crypto founders to major global corporations, to hear expert advice on crypto crime, trading, regulation, and more.
Since 2021, crypto ownership among US adults has doubled to 28% of the population, recently helped by the US administration’s willingness to embrace crypto.
Within a few years, experts believe this uptake will extend globally as public trust and understanding of the blockchain and crypto space improve.
Sooner or later, more companies will incorporate crypto within their business as firms like Tesla have done. Hence, they need to be aware of the risks and opportunities.
At the moment, successful blockchain and crypto leaders are still few and far between, with as much as 90% of enterprise blockchain projects failing within just over a year.
Though current success rates may improve in the coming years as the market matures, founders need as much advice as they can get to be successful.
Exhibitor and guest passes can be found here.
COMPUTEX 2025, taking place in Taipei, is often regarded as the largest tech show in Asia.
This year, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, is due to deliver a keynote address, where he will discuss the latest advancements in AI, graphics, and computing technologies.
Considering how pivotal the chip firm has been for AI development of late, Huang’s address is bound to attract record attendees alone. Because of this demand, the event will be livestreamed globally.
Huang’s talk comes at a strange time for Nvidia.
Though the chip firm recently revealed a revolutionary GPU expected to redefine AI workflows, the introduction of US tariffs has shrouded the current conversation, with Nvidia facing $5.5bn in costs.
With much of the tech community in limbo, audiences will be looking to see how Huang and Nvidia navigate the current crisis that many companies are facing.
Nvidia's share price and the loyalty of its investors hang in the balance, as does the progress of AI firms relying on their chips.
You can register for Huang's talk here.
ETS 2025 is set to be a huge event for stakeholders across the energy industry.
Taking place in San Antonio, leaders will meet to discuss a range of issues and trends, such as responding to world disasters, making the grid greener, using AI to drive innovation, besides much more.
Key speakers include:
Rudy D. Garza (President & CEO, CPS Energy), the leader of the largest municipally owned electric and natural gas utility in the United States.
Deanna Rodriguez (President & CEO, Entergy), the head of a major energy company serving the Gulf Coast region.
Paul Lau (CEO & General Manager, SMUD), known for implementing ambitious carbon neutrality goals.
Beyond this, there are over 80 more senior executives set to share their insights.
In the coming years, the energy sector is set to face significant pressures.
Geopolitical uncertainty.
Green energy policy shifts.
A shortfall of grid capacity for AI and EVs.
More world disasters.
Meanwhile, energy demand is rising, up by 2.2% last year.
Though there are many online resources leaders can turn to, there’s no better experience than convening with other like-minded experts who understand your pain points, having navigated them themselves.
Registration forms can be found here.
GITEX Europe 2025, held in Berlin, is considered by many as the premier startup event, showcasing innovations across AI, cybersecurity, and digital transformation.
The GITEX brand is so big that it also holds events in Dubai and Morocco, which gives it a truly global appeal.
But what makes this edition stand out is the fact that it's secured notable speakers, including Geoffrey Hinton, widely regarded as "The Godfather of AI,".
From founders pitching to win €100,000 in equity-free investment to technology risk assessment panels, GITEX Europe offers attendees an experience they might struggle to find elsewhere.
Geoffrey Hinton’s keynote should be enough to encourage attendees alone.
The 2024 Nobel Prize winner and computer scientist helped develop the artificial neural networks that became the foundation for machine learning from as early as the late 70s.
Because of this, Hinton has seen the technology evolve from basic automation capabilities to the brink of artificial general intelligence, which he says he’s worried about.
For founders developing new AI products, particularly those that pose particular risks, there’s no better person to listen to than Hinton for unbiased, informed perspectives.
You can register for the event here.
Vancouver is the latest host for a Web Summit event, which has previously taken place in Rio, Doha, Lisbon, and Toronto.
Each year, the event aims to bring together a host of global tech leaders, startups, and investors to explore the future of innovation, share game-changing ideas, and build meaningful partnerships that shape the tech landscape.
Unlike other tech conferences, the summit particularly prides itself on being youthful, offering both formal and informal networking initiatives for early-stage founders.
The Guardian has called the event “Glastonbury for geeks”, The Atlantic “where the future goes to be born”, and Inc “the best technology conference on the planet”.
Again, like many other tech conferences on this list, speakers will be navigating how startups can secure VC funding, what the future of AI looks like, among other ongoing trends.
Not only is this event set in the startup capital of Canada, but it's the only major tech conference steps away fro the oceanfront, full of indie coffee shop pitching sessions and impromptu brainstorms that go into the night.
This is more of a festival than a forum, aimed at making startup culture feel vibrant and exciting, which it should.
It's the ideal event for founders to navigate mounting challenges, persevere, innovate, and succeed.
You can register for a ticket here.
The Banking Tech Awards USA 2025, held in New York City, is hosted annually by the global fintech publication Fintech Futures.
The event aims to celebrate the achievements of banking and fintech experts at a time when the industry is undergoing rapid transformation.
From the rise of embedded finance and AI-driven banking to shifting regulations and evolving customer expectations, the winners of these awards have a unique chance to showcase their expertise in a crowded field.
Key award categories include:
Best credit union/community bank & fintech partnership
Best bank & fintech partnership
Best tech overhaul
Best core banking system
Though the event’s finalists have already been confirmed, for investors or potential banks looking to partner with a fintech, this is one of the best opportunities to scope out innovators who have already proven their impact.
After all, 45% of award-winning businesses report that they were able to establish new partnerships or collaborations as a direct result of their recognition.
So, it might just be a good idea to attend the evening, start a few conversations, and get ahead of any competition.
Tickets for the awards are available here.