Building At the Frontier of AI

In the week of NVIDIA GTC Berlin, we're gathering founders and entrepreneurs at Merantix AI Campus for the questions that actually matter right now: what it takes to build in Physical AI, where agentic systems and open models are heading, and who's shaping the next generation of AI companies.

We'll open with a founder panel, then move into an interactive unconference (as we like to call it) where the room sets the agenda across three tracks: Physical AI, Agentic AI and open models, and an open format for whatever you want to dig into.

Throughout the morning, NVIDIA's Startup Ecosystem and Inception team will be on site to connect with founders directly, talk through what it takes to build and scale, and help you get closer to compute, credits and go-to-market support.

The morning will culminate in a live watch party of the NVIDIA GTC keynote with NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang.

Expect sharp technical exchange, new connections, and plenty of space to shape the conversation yourself.

Speakers

🎤 Howard Wright – VP Startup Ecosystem, NVIDIA
He leads NVIDIA’s Startup Ecosystem, helping founders build and scale through Inception after leading AWS’s global startup program and holding leadership roles at Intel and Qualcomm.

🎤 Neil Zeghidour – Co-founder and CEO, Gradium
He founded Gradium after leading generative audio teams at Meta and Google DeepMind, with work spanning AudioLM, Moshi, and Hibiki.

🎤 Silviu Homoceanu – Co-founder and CTO, Almetra
He co-founded Almetra to bring AI and computer vision to manufacturing, helping factories improve production efficiency after working on self-driving systems at Volkswagen.

Moderator

🎤 Laetizia Hellmeister - Investor, Merantix Capital

She invests in AI at Merantix Capital, following earlier roles at Redstone and baby vc, and consulting experience at BCG and Accenture.

Agenda

08:30 Doors open & breakfast networking 08:55 Welcome from NVIDIA & Merantix 09:00 Founder panel discussion 09:45 Introduction from the NVIDIA Inception team 09:50 Coffee break 10:00 Four breakout sessions: Physical AI | AI-natives | VCs & Fundraising | Open Unconference 11:00 Live stream of the NVIDIA GTC keynote with CEO Jensen Huang 13:00 Wrap-up

About your hosts

Merantix AI Campus: In the heart of Berlin, the Campus is home to 80+ AI teams and hosts 300+ events a year. Part of Merantix, driving Europe’s AI future since 2016, the Campus brings together founders, engineers, researchers, operators, investors and industry leaders working on the next generation of AI companies and technologies.

NVIDIA is the world leader in AI and accelerated computing.It's Inception is a free program that guides AI startups through the NVIDIA platform and ecosystem. Inception members have access to the latest developer tools and training, preferred pricing on NVIDIA hardware and software, exclusive offers from partners, and exposure to a global ecosystem of investors.

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