Announcing the Open Web Asia ‘08

Hi, we are the organizing team of the Open Web Asia ‘08 conference. Or to be more specific (although you probably wouldn’t care), we are Andrew, Angus, Benjamin, Bernard, Chang, Gang, George, Howie, John, Shun, and Tangos.

So why does Asia need another web conference? Doesn’t each and every country in Asia already have almost too many web conferences? Why Open Web Asia?

Well, you know what? We are coming from China, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, USA, France, and Austria - and that just about describes the kind of conference we have been trying to create. A first truly pan-Asian web conference where Asia’s web innovations can be introduced to the rest of the world in English; A world-class web event with “killer speakers” where thought leaders from the Asian web industry as well as from the Silicon Valley share their insights; A unique chance to discuss intra-regional business opportunities, say, how effectively a Korean web company can be funded by a Japanese VC and launch in the Chinese market; And last but not least, a great networking event where the audience can bump into the “movers and shakers” from Asia and the rest of the world.

Aiming to create such a conference, we gathered together as a virtual team and put in significant amount of time and energy although all of us have full time jobs. And after some 90 discussion threads on our Google group (each thread with easily over 10-20 posts), we are finally making this official announcement today: We are now all ready to do this conference.

Open Web Asia will be held in Seoul, Korea on October 14, 2008.  (See venue here). We all know conferences first and foremost come down to speakers and panelists, so without further ado, we give these A-list speakers to you (in alphabetical order):

• Kevin Day (CEO, Comsenz) (China)
• Arthur Chang (VP of Global Sales, Alibaba) (China)
• Yongjoon Hyoung (CEO of StoryBlender & Founder of Cyworld) (Korea)
• Yongseok Jang (Senior Director, eBay Asia Pacific) (Korea)
• Yozo Kaneko (Director and COO of ngi group, inc.) (Japan)
• James W. Kim (CEO of Yahoo!’s Korea Region) (Korea)
• Jimmy Kim (Executive Vice President, Nexon Corp.) (Korea)
• Loic Le Meur (CEO, Seesmic) (USA)
• Ram Lee (Head of Communities, NHN Corporation (Naver)) (Korea)
• Kent Lindström (Senior Vice President, Corporate Development, Friendster) (USA)
• Shusaku Maruko (General Manager, Corporate Strategy Department, Felica) (Japan)
• Jean K. Min (Communications Director, Ohmynews) (Korea)
• Akio Tanaka (Partner, Infinity Ventures) (Japan)
• Bill Wang (VP of Overseas Business, Perfect World) (China)
• Andreas Weigend (Consultant & Lecturer; Former Chief Scientist of Amazon) (USA)

And these are only partial list of the confirmed speakers, as a few more speakers are expected to confirm for the coming days/weeks. For more details on the speakers and the companies they are representing for, please check out the speakers page.

If this superb list of speakers/panelists isn’t enough of a good reason for you to come to the conference, there is another good one. Open Web Asia ‘08 will be held in close association with the World Knowledge Forum, a world-class business forum whose past speakers include Bill Gates, Alan Greenspan, Michael Dell, Colin Powell, Jack Welch, and so on. The World Knowledge Forum will be held on October 15-16, on the same venue as the Open Web Asia ‘08, so you will have the luxury of joining two great conferences at a single span of three days and at the same venue. (Separate registration required.)

An added bonus will be the special subsidy from the World Knowledge Forum to all attendees, making the effective registration fees $200 (that’s a 50% discount from our original ticket price, $400) - the value is tough to beat, given the program and the networking opportunities.

So what are you waiting for? Register away - wait, the online registration will be up in late August, as we are currently working on some technical details. But we don’t want you to keep track of things, so you can leave us an email and we’ll notify you when the registration goes up. (See the registration page). If you need a material to present to your boss to prove you are not going to vacation that’s disguised as a conference, there’s an official PR for you to download.

Finally, we are actively seeking sponsorship opportunities now - without doubt, the Open Web Asia will be one of the best web conferences for your organization to sponsor. So if you are interested in sponsorship, please visit the Sponsor page.