Celebrating our 10th anniversary, hubraum-style

Last week we said THANK YOU to our hubraum family in style! We wanted to express our gratitude to our supporters, team and friends for supporting us through a decade of innovation — and what better way to do so than with a celebration to remember? The 10th anniversary party was every bit as colourful and exciting as such a big birthday merits.

We kicked off with a welcome speech delivered digitally by Claudia Nemat, a board member for Management, Technology & Innovation at Deutsche Telekom. Claudia reminisced about the earliest days of hubraum’s existence, when many believed that what the incubator was trying to pull off was impossible.

She was followed by Jörg Rheinboldt, the Managing Director of APX, Europe’s earliest stage VC (backed by Axel Springer and Porsche), who took to the stage in person to talk about the patterns and principles of startup success over the last ten years and beyond.

Talks and discussions followed. First up was a video interview between hubraum Axel Menneking, former CEO of Deutsche Telekom, Rene Obermann and current CEO Tim Höttges, in which Axel asked why, given the challenging climate for launching a tech incubator ten years ago, Tim and Rene gave the project the go ahead. After this, Axel, Jerzy Grzesiak (head of hubraum Krakow), Sean Seaton (Deutsche Telekom, Technology & Innovation) and Henry Lane Fox (Founders Factory) took to the stage (accompanied via video by Deutsche Telekom’s Omar Tazi, Chief Product and Innovation Officer) to discuss the next next for hubraum.

“Strategy and ideas without execution is hallucination,” said Sean, and this set the tone for a conversation about the importance of follow-through. Finally, hubraum’s original founder Peter Borchers interviewed Jörg Rheinboldt (APX), Henry Lane Fox (Founders Factory), Karim Attia (UBIRCH) and Florian Steger (hubraum), about whether investing in startups has paid off for corporates and vice versa.

Most exciting of all were the string of announcements made at our birthday party —  the news broke that Deutsche Telekom is launching the T phone, a 5G smartphone which will democratize 5G (making it available “for every pocket”) and which was developed in partnership with Google. Plus, our T Developers Portal was also announced, offering APIs to help build more telco-enabled products and services — stay tuned for more on this.

Throughout the party, guests wandered into the second courtyard, where they were able to try out Spree Interactive’s incredible VR-fuelled bumper cars. Meanwhile, those inside played ZAUBAR’s AR-fuelled scavenger hunt/quiz, which involved cunning and looking at the space for objects which combined to give you access to a quiz question.

We shared an enormous cake between over 250 people, watched a magician, devoured canapes, got a custom-made cocktail made specially for us. But there was also a feast for the senses in our garage, where some of our startups showcased their incredible products and experiences.  

Soon, it was time to hit the dancefloor. It was an incredible evening, full of insights from some of the sharpest minds in tech. But the best part? Getting to see you all in person.

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