Techweek begins today – a week-long focus on tech startups

Techweek Kanasas City opens today (Monday) – beginning a week-long technology conference and festival in Downtown KC.

Techweek Kansas City is back!

Today marks the pre-conference opening of a week-long run of the second, annual Techweek conference + festival in Downtown KC. Techweek – featuring the LaunchKC global grants competition Friday – opens later today and runs through the weekend in and around Union Station, the Power & Light District and the Crossroads Arts District.

Highlights of the week ahead a week filled with industry leading speakers and panels (today thru Friday) – including Jeff Hoffman, founder of Priceline (Thursday); the Techweek KC kickoff party (tonight); a Tech Carnival at the KC Startup Village (Tuesday); the nationally acclaimed Big Data Summit (Wednesday thru Friday); a Tech Leader happy hour featuring Mayor Sly James (Wednesday); the Entrepreneur Expo – featuring the top 100 LaunchKC applicants – (Thursday); the Techweek Hiring Fair (Friday); the LaunchKC competition final rounds (Friday morning) and ceremonial selection of the 10 LaunchKC grant recipients (Friday afternoon); and the Techweek Hackathon (Saturday).

And, of course, that doesn’t even touch the receptions and parties and round our the Techweek festivities every evening this week.

So, are you ready to Techweek KC? Here is what’s on tap for today:

Techweek KC: Today, Monday, Sept. 12:

• 4:30-5:15 p.m. Uber, Startups and the Future of Tech, presented by Brian McClendon, vice president of Maps and Business Platform at Uber. @ Sprint Accelerator 210 W 19 Terr.

• 5:15-6 p.m. The Connected Professional Athlete, discussion featuring moderator Ilya Tabakh, CEO of Edge Up Sports, and panelists Scott Burgett, director of Health Engineering at Garmin; Tracis Kelce, tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs; Mateus Manoel, health fitness coach for Sporting Kansas City; and J. Paul Schroeppel, M.D., orthopedic surgeon at University of Kansas Hospital. @ Sprint Accelerator 210 W 19 Terr.

• 6-9 p.m. Techweek Kickoff Party presented by Garmin @ Up-Down KC, 101 Southwest Blvd.

Techweek, the nation’s largest technology conference + festival, selected Kansas City in late 2014 to be its sixth or now eight U.S. hubs for its unique and immersive blend of tech learning, collaborating and networking. Other Techweek cities to hold annual conferences + festivals include Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Detroit, beginning this year, Dallas and Toronto.

For registration information and the complete Techweek schedule, visit techweek.com/kansascity and launchKC.org.