Join us at CVCF 2026 to explore how startups can scale and win in the age of AI.
Updated
October 29, 2026 11:39 PM
CVCF 2026 takes place on 4–5 November at Cyberport, Hong Kong. IMAGE: CYBERPORT
AI can help you build a startup, but it won’t automatically make you stand out. When everyone has access to similar tools, you need to give customers a reason to choose you and investors a reason to back you. So, how do you turn innovation into a competitive edge?
That question sits at the heart of Cyberport Venture & Capital Forum (CVCF) 2026, taking place on 4–5 November under the theme “Scaling in a Changing World: Winning the Next Competitive Cycle” and the message “Scale Up & Win.”
The two-day forum will feature more than 80 speakers discussing venture investment, AI-driven growth, emerging technologies and expansion into new markets. Day 1 will explore global investment trends and the next wave of innovation. Day 2 will feature CVCF 2026’s spotlight event, the Agentic Economy Summit, examining how agentic AI and digital assets could reshape business and finance. The wider programme will also include investor matching, founder pitches, 100+ Innovator Showcase, startup workshops and clinics.
With founders and investors navigating a fast-changing technology landscape, CVCF 2026 will explore what it takes to stay competitive, scale into new markets and turn emerging opportunities into business growth. Here’s a look at the key programmes lined up for this year’s forum.
Keynotes and Panels: Finding the Next Big Opportunity
Taara founder and CEO Mahesh Krishnaswamy will deliver the keynote The Innovation Playbook: Capitalizing on Moonshots and Faster Cycles in the Age of AI. The wider Day 1 programme will cover global investment trends, expansion into new markets, agentic AI and one-person companies.
For startups navigating the AI market, the panel Mastering the AI Bubble: Capital Rerouting and How Global Champions Stand Out will bring together panellists from Quona Capital, Alumni Ventures, FOV Ventures and Capital6 to discuss how investors assess startups and distinguish commercial potential from market hype. Other sessions will explore emerging technologies beyond AI software, including embodied AI, advanced computing and commercial aerospace.
Investor Matching and Networking: Connecting with Capital
Away from the conference sessions, MatchEasy will help founders and investors arrange one-to-one meetings, either onsite or online. Confirmed participants will receive access to the platform to explore potential matches and schedule meetings.
Investors can also discover local and international startups through the Founder Pitch programme, where entrepreneurs present their projects and ventures. Meanwhile, the Innovator Showcase offers a separate opportunity to explore emerging technology solutions through a virtual platform and selected on-site exhibits.
For founders seeking more tailored guidance, the Startup Clinics will offer one-to-one discussions with industry experts and experienced entrepreneurs on business challenges, fundraising and growth. Advance registration is required.
Hands-On Workshops: Strengthening Your Investment Pitch
Turning an innovative idea into a business that investors can back takes more than a strong pitch. CVCF 2026 will host practical workshops to help founders strengthen their fundraising strategies and make a stronger case to investors.
Led by Capital6 advisor Christine Keung, one workshop will explore how founders can align technical innovation with business goals, communicate their product’s value and prepare for fundraising. Another, led by Jeremy Dalton, advisor at FOV Ventures and SXSW Pitch, will help founders understand how investors assess startups, with opportunities to pitch live and receive direct feedback.
CVCF 2026’s spotlight event, the Agentic Economy Summit, will take place on 5 November under the theme “Intelligent Frontiers, Tokenised Horizons: Where Agentic AI Reshapes Business and Digital Assets Redefine How Value Moves.”
The summit will bring together technology and finance leaders to explore how agentic AI and digital assets could change the way businesses operate. Wolf Ruzicka, chief commercial officer at Unlimit, a global payments company, will discuss building and scaling agentic AI applications. Dr Feng Xiao, chairman and CEO of HashKey Group, will examine how digital identity, tokenised assets and money connect on-chain.
The discussions will also look at agent-led commerce, including how AI agents could help customers choose products and make purchases, and the payment systems needed to support these transactions. Other topics include Hong Kong dollar stablecoins and their potential role in payments and settlement, as well as the rise of one-person companies. The summit will also explore how founders can use AI agents to run their businesses with smaller teams, find customers and generate recurring revenue.
From AI-driven growth and cross-border investment to agentic AI and digital assets, CVCF 2026 brings together the people and ideas shaping the next phase of business. Whether you're preparing to raise capital, exploring new markets or assessing emerging technologies, the forum offers an opportunity to gain fresh perspectives and connect with investors, founders and industry leaders.
Exclusive for Ventureport readers: Use the promotional code cvcf26vp to access a Full Access Pass for HK$300, subject to confirmation of the offer by the organiser.
Date: 4–5 November 2026
Function Rooms, Level 3, Core E, Cyberport 3, Hong Kong
Keep Reading
Can SPhotonix’s optical memory technology protect data better than today’s storage?
Updated
January 8, 2026 6:32 PM
SPhotonix's 5D Memory Crystals™. PHOTO: SPHOTONIX
SPhotonix, a young deep-tech startup, is working on something unexpected for the data storage world: tiny, glass-like crystals that can hold enormous amounts of information for extremely long periods of time. The company works where light and data meet, using photonics—the science of shaping and guiding light—to build optical components and explore a new form of memory called “5D optical storage”.
It’s based on research that began more than twenty years ago, when Professor Peter Kazansky showed that a small crystal could preserve data—from the human genome to the entire Wikipedia—essentially forever.
Their new US$4.5 million pre-seed round, led by Creator Fund and XTX Ventures, is meant to turn that science into real products. And the timing aligns with a growing problem: the world is generating far more digital data than current storage systems can handle. Most of it isn’t needed every day, but it can’t be thrown away either. This long-term, rarely accessed cold data is piling up faster than existing storage infrastructure can manage and maintaining giant warehouses of servers just to keep it all alive is becoming expensive and environmentally unsustainable.
This is the problem SPhotonix is stepping in to solve. They want to store huge amounts of information in a stable format that doesn’t degrade, doesn’t need electricity to preserve data and doesn’t require constant swapping of hardware. Instead of racks of spinning drives, the idea is a durable optical crystal storage system that could last for generations.
The company’s underlying technology—called FemtoEtch™—uses ultrafast lasers to engrave microscopic patterns inside fused silica. These precisely etched structures can function as high-performance optical components for fields like aerospace, microscopy and semiconductor manufacturing. But the same ultra-controlled process can also encode information in five dimensions within the crystal, transforming the material into a compact, long-lasting archive capable of holding massive amounts of information in a very small footprint.
The new funding allows SPhotonix to expand its engineering team, grow its R&D facility in Switzerland and prepare the technology for real-world deployment. Investors say the opportunity is significant: global data generation has more than doubled in recent years and traditional storage systems—drives, disks, tapes—weren’t designed for the scale or longevity modern data demands.
While the company has been gaining attention in research circles (and even made an appearance in the latest Mission Impossible film), its next step is all about practical adoption. If the technology reaches commercial viability, it could offer an alternative to the energy-hungry, short-lived storage hardware that underpins much of today’s digital infrastructure.
As digital information continues to multiply, preserving it safely and sustainably is becoming one of the biggest challenges in modern computing. SPhotonix’s work points toward a future where long-lasting, low-maintenance optical data storage becomes a practical alternative to today’s fragile systems. It offers a more resilient way to preserve knowledge for the decades ahead.