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  • SF IRL - September 16th, 2024

SF IRL - September 16th, 2024

A curated newsletter showcasing the top tech & startup events in San Francisco

Author

Jonathan Chang
September 16, 2024

Hi SF IRL! There's a ton of vibrance and energy coming back into the city and at SF IRL, we are excited to be a part of it. Excited to come with you all with some great events for Issue #105. Happy conference season and SaaStr!

I'm Jonathan, the creator of SF IRL. I've been a Bay Area resident all my life and moved into San Francisco about 3 years ago. My full-time job is at Brex as an XIR where I meet founders and VCs while trying to create a community in the city. My vision for SF IRL is simple. Showcase the best tech + startup events in SF and to connect all of our builders and investors together. We are a growing community having over 7500+ subscribers. As we keep growing, if you enjoy reading these, please share this with your friends so we can hit 8,000 readers. As always, SF IRL is one of my many side projects. If you like to be involved in helping, please shoot me an email!

Events Coming Up 🎉

Sept 19th, 2024 - Brex Omakase Dinner: On Raising Your PreSeed Round

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6:30pm

What: ​​This event is for founders raising their pre-seed round & investors investing in preseed companies. You are cordially invited to an exclusive Brex Omakase Dinner in San Francisco.

​This isn't just another dinner. Our aim is to create opportunities for meaningful connections and celebrate our successes & failures together. By the end of the evening, you'll have made new friends and business contacts, as well as gained actionable insights on how to achieve the next milestone in your journey 🌟

​Indulge in an Omakase dinner, featuring over 10 courses, while you create invaluable connections with fellow founders in an intimate setting.

I’ve also been hosting a variety of GP/LP dinners for emerging managers in the Bay Area, if you are an emerging GP or an LP that invests in emerging managers, please fill out this form if you’re interested in getting invited to future GP/LP Dinners that I throw in SF.

I’ve made a form to connect the best founders raising with my list of VCs. If you are a founder raising your next round and want to potentially be featured to investors in the SF IRL network, please fill out this form.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 5:30-7:30pm

What: Join us for an exciting evening of Generative AI demos at Wilson Sonsini in San Francisco.

Generative AI is truly changing our lives and the way we work - opening up new use cases and opportunities.

See how startups are leveraging LLMs from OpenAI, Anthropic, Cohere, Google, Mistral, Meta, Perplexity, and more - to create compelling new applications and solutions.

This is a great opportunity to see the latest applications of Generative AI in action and to network with and learn from fellow Gen AI enthusiasts.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 12-4pm

What: Curious what the brilliant minds of SPC are up to?

​​​​Join us for a showcase of the latest demos from SPC alumni and members, from early-stage hacking projects to Series C product releases. There are no slideshows—these are live demos only!

​​​Demos will be in person at SPC-SF from 12:30-2:30pm PT and simultaneously live-streamed on Zoom to approved guests. After demos wrap we will host an open house until 4pm PT for anyone interested in joining SPC. We hope you'll join us in person!

Sept 18th, 2024 - AI Salon & SF Intellectuals

Location: San Francisco

Time: 7-9:30pm

What: Join us for a special event where the Ai Salon joins with the SF Intellectuals for vibrant discussions! This will be a broad and accessible event where anyone who is interested in what AI means for our future is welcome!

​AI isn't just a technical topic! Instead, it is a technically-coded mirror to reflect how humanity is advancing. Grappling with it is grappling with our human journey and draws on philosophy, history, sociology, and yes, scientific and technological perspectives. Thinking about AI sharpens conversations around humanity's power, our progress, and our direction by giving focus to what is otherwise vague musings.

Sept 18th, 2024 - California AI Dreaming

Location: Palo Alto

Time: 5-8pm

What: ​Calling all AI and tech innovators! Whether you've just wrapped up Dreamforce or you're passionate about driving change in the SaaS industry, you're welcome to the party. Network with like-minded professionals in a vibrant and relaxed atmosphere 🌇

Sept 18th, 2024 - Dreamforce Happy Hour

Location: San Francisco

Time: 4-6pm

What: Join us for a relaxed evening of networking and discussion at our Dreamforce happy hour! Enjoy drinks and snacks while chatting with fellow attendees about the latest in AI technologies and go-to-market strategies. This is a great opportunity to exchange ideas, make new connections, and unwind after a day of conference sessions.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 9:30am-12pm

What: Join us for a transformative morning sail where you’ll witness the iconic Golden Gate Bridge from breathtaking new angles –– while gaining equally fresh perspectives on the future of marketing.

​Envision this:

  • ​Meaningful discussions about emerging trends

  • ​Strategies that will define our field in the years to come

  • ​Sunshine, salty waves, scenic views

  • ​Bottomless mimosas

​We have designed this event to offer CMOs unmatched opportunities to network, reflect, and steer towards innovative horizons in marketing.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 5:30-9pm

What: ​If you're beyond the idea/prototype stage, and working on scaling an AI product, platform, or service, this event is just for you.

​This night is about bringing the SF North Bay community together to help each other scale-up.

​Apply now, tell us what you're scaling and at what level and we'll match you with other Marin & Sonoma innovators working at similar scale, so you can share your pains and gains with local peers.

​For this event, we encourage authentic discussion and knowledge sharing over basic networking. Through this, you'll create more valuable connections too.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 5:30-8pm

What: Learn how to build Agentic Workflows, where large language models (LLMs) act autonomously to perform tasks or provide assistance on behalf of users. Participants will learn to leverage capabilities in AWS Bedrock to create both chatbot and non-chatbot workflows, incorporating features such as code interpretation and memory. We will also use Amazon Q Developer to assist in coding and debugging.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 9am-4pm

What: ​Build an AI Scheduler: Smart Meetings with Zoom, LlamaIndex & Qdrant @ AWS

​The Qdrant team, in partnership with AWS, LlamaIndex and Zoom invites you to the AWS AI Engineering Loft where we will show you hands on how to build a state of the art RAG application. Simon Suo, Co-Founder and CTO at LlamaIndex will give the closing talk.

Sept 21st, 2024 - Aiify.io Agentic AI World Hackathon

Location: San Francisco

Time: 9:30am

What: This high energy hackathon leverages the latest cutting edge tools and platforms, giving teams the opportunity to build agentic driven solutions with the potential to break out and become the next unicorns (or decacorns) in the space.

The Agentic AI World Hackathon is a 2-Day In-Person Event. Remote participate is supported, but a presenting team member must be in-person for judging.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 9:30am

What: come explore new applications of machine learning with the goal of solving large problems in global healthcare!

​doctors, designers, developers and researchers are all welcome.

​this will be a collaborative 24hr weekend to build and demo interesting projects.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 10am

What: Human annotations can be slow and expensive - using LLMs instead promises to solve this. However aligning a LLM Judge with human judgements is often hard with many implementation details to consider.

​During this in- person hackathon, build LLM Judges together and move the field forward a little by: 

  • ​Productionizing the latest LLM-evaluator research

  • ​Improving on your existing judge

  • ​Building annotation UIs

  • ​Designing wireframes for collaborative annotation between humans and AI

Location: San Francisco

Time: 5:30-8:30pm

What: Join AI21 Labs and AWS for a night of generative AI knowledge sharing, as we look under the hood of Jamba, the first production grade Transformer+Mamba model; and we explore techniques for AI-assisted code generation. All AI enthusiasts and learners welcome.

Sept 24th, 2024 - MindsDB Launch Celebration

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6-9pm

What: Join us at MindsDB HQ for a special night of product announcements, food, and fun with our amazing local AI community.

We will unveil our latest product launch and discuss the advancements we’ve been working on to support developers in achieving their AI goals. 

​​But that's not all—get excited for an immersive art experience that will transport you into a world where technology and creativity collide! Whether you're here to learn, network, or simply have a great time with the local AI community, we look forward to welcoming you to the MindsDB HQ!

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6-8pm

What: 🌟 Join us for the Quantum Gen AI Lecture Series! đźŚź

​Hosted by the Quantum Society, this edition, "Quantum Communications," will dive into groundbreaking advancements in quantum communications and their role in building a more secure and connected future.

Sept 25th, 2024 - SF CoS Coffee Meetup

Location: San Francisco

Time: 11am-12pm

What: Come connect with other CoS in San Francisco for coffee!

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6-9pm

What: Who: This Week in Fintech & Rutter and SF Fintech's best operators, investors, and founders

​​​​​What: SF Happy Hour with an open bar & light bites

​​​​​Where: Peacekeeper, 925 Bush St, San Francisco, CA 94109

​​​​​When: Wednesday, September 25th at 6pm

​​​​​Why: Rutter API and This Week in Fintech invite you to a relaxed evening of connection with product and engineering leaders from B2B fintech companies and financial institutions. This gathering is a chance to share the latest industry trends and product developments aimed at addressing the financial challenges faced by SMBs.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 5:30-8pm

What: ​Join us for an enlightening evening on Wednesday, September 25, 2024, as we explore the world of data, fine-tuning, and serverless infrastructure with industry leaders Airtrain AI, OpenPipe, and Modal Labs. Our gathering is being graciously hosted by Sentry.io.

​This event is designed for AI practitioners building AI-enabled technologies and will offer a unique opportunity to network and learn from fellow AI professionals.

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6-10pm

What: Create AI-enabled music videos in one night! Get together and meet new folks working, building, and creating in the AI scene with the latest AI tools. Get hands-on experience with cutting-edge AI tools, plus meet fellow innovators in the AI space.

​Form teams, craft short films, and dive into AI prompting. By night's end, we'll showcase our work and vote on the top video. Winners get fun prizes from our sponsor: Fantastic Day.

​Open to all skill levels - from AI newbies to seasoned pros. Please bring your laptop!

Sept 26th, 2024 - SF Creator Economy Mixer

Location: San Francisco

Time: 6-9pm

What: We are bringing together the Creator Economy in San Francisco.

​Whether you are a creator, a brand involved in influencer marketing, or an agency, we want you here!

Sept 27th, 2024 - AI Infra Summit

Location: San Francisco

Time: 10am-5pm

What: Experience the convergence of the ecosystem at the AI INFRA SUMMIT – the game-changing, deep-tech event of the season!  Headlined by industry giants AMD and Supermicro, this groundbreaking summit unites pioneers and innovators defining the future of AI.

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