Vote for the TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 Audience Choice Sessions
Vote by September 4 to choose four of 11 Audience Choice sessions for TechCrunch Founder Summit in Boston on November 4, and save up to $100 on tickets.
Summary
As of August 25, 2026, voting is open to select four of 11 Audience Choice finalists for TechCrunch Founder Summit in Boston on November 4. Voting closes September 4, while ticket discounts offer savings of up to $100.
Blueprint Lab founder Alexandra Ames proposes an early-stage events strategy session. Exowatt CEO Hannan Happi covers scalable U.S. hardware manufacturing, supply chains, factories, the IRA and CHIPS Act. Draper Associates partner Andy Tang examines market-creating startups that defy existing categories. Procore Technologies data engineering head Shishir Tewar proposes a GraphRAG pipeline using golden records, Neo4j, local Ollama models and validated Cypher queries. ADIN.AI managing partner Merve Kitapci explains winning L’Oréal and Vodafone before Series A through agency partnerships, pricing and zero organic churn. Percona CEO Peter Farkas shares 20 years of bootstrapping an open source company beyond $50 million in revenue.
IFTTT CEO Linden Tibbets argues that AI can help five-person teams outship companies with 500 engineers. Ambi Robotics CTO Jeff Mahler addresses the gap between impressive AI demonstrations and reliable production systems. CIQ founder Gregory Kurtzer covers creating CentOS, launching Rocky Linux after Red Hat discontinued CentOS, and scaling durable open source organizations. Genoa Ventures founder Vikram Chaudhery evaluates healthcare AI through clinical timing, workflow impact and agentic systems. Untapped Ventures founder George Bandarian explains what YC, a16z Speedrun and top-tier venture firms seek from early-stage AI and robotics founders.
Positives
- Four of 11 finalist sessions will earn agenda slots through audience voting.
- Ticket discounts can save Founder Summit attendees up to $100.
- Peter Farkas will share 20 years of experience bootstrapping Percona beyond $50 million in revenue.
- Shishir Tewar’s proposed GraphRAG session covers Neo4j, Ollama and validated Cypher queries for reducing LLM hallucinations.
- Merve Kitapci’s session details how ADIN.AI secured L’Oréal and Vodafone before raising a Series A.
- Linden Tibbets proposes tactics for helping five-person AI teams compete with organizations employing 500 engineers.
Risks & concerns
- Seven of the 11 finalist sessions will not receive one of the four available agenda slots.
- Voting closes September 4, leaving a limited window before the November 4 summit.
- Jeff Mahler warns that impressive AI demonstrations may fail to become reliable, scalable businesses.
- Vikram Chaudhery argues that many healthcare AI demonstrations never reach useful clinical workflows.
- Hannan Happi’s proposal acknowledges that scaling U.S. hardware manufacturing remains widely viewed as prohibitively expensive.
- George Bandarian says technical AI and robotics founders can fail because they misunderstand investor expectations beyond product quality.
