It Was Twenty Years Ago Today When Swedish Beers First Came to Play in Barcelona

Doesn't time fly! I can hardly believe it but it's 20 years since Swedish Beers first came to BCN at MWC! It wasn't even called Mobile World Congress back then, it was 3GSM and it took over La Fira at Placa Espanya. I took a last minute decision to head to Barcelona for a few days and take in the show. (I'd missed out on visiting 3GSM at Cannes due to the lack of accommodation and the huge cost of staying anywhere remotely nearby.) 

I'd already been hosting Swedish Beers in London at that point for almost 5 years so I put the word out I'd be in town and some of my regulars and some international bloggers about mobile who I'd met online turned up in a bar in a hotel in Gracia. There were about 25 of us there if I remember rightly. Not only was it lovely to hang out with my tribe but I also saw that week that there was a real need for a more grass roots style event during Mobile World Congress where people could connect on a human level. I feel that is still true today. Little could I imagine back then that I would still be doing this 20 years later! But here I am.

The next Swedish Beers party is happening next week on Wednesday 4 March from 7pm onwards and we're back at Space Cowboy where I'm sure we'll be well looked after by Adam and his team at the bar. And for conversation and good vibes, we'll have Shanks Kulam and Nick Allott with beer tokens in hand. More sponsors tba.

If you work in or around mobile, this networking event is for you! RSVP required and you can do that over on Eventbrite.

If you'd like to connect with several hundred mobilists, meet everyone on the night, and create and contribute to memories that people will be talking about for years to come, please sponsor the event. Sponsorships available from £500. All the money goes behind the bar and to the related people and admin costs of running the event. This is not a money-making exercise for me. The more sponsors, the more beer tokens and the more fun for everyone. Please contact me to discuss to help the legend live on.

Below are some memories from last year's bash.

See you in Barcelona! Tell your friends! Let's have a blast!

Skål

Helen

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Swedish Beers is back in Barcelona once more for Mobile World Congress!

The Swedish Beers team is busy getting organised for this year's edition of Swedish Beers in Barcelona! We loved Muy Buenas and its fab team so much last year that we've booked in with them again.

The format will be just the same - a relaxed evening, no formalities, no presentations. Just come with an open mind, be prepared to see friends old and new, chat, enjoy a drink or three (courtesy of our sponsors) and have yourself a good time all whilst extolling (or not) the virtues of our mobile connected world.

The Swedish Beers crew will be on hand to welcome you as usual and we'll have the friendliest bar staff in town in we're in one of the most stylish and historic bars in town on two floors. Muy Buenas will also have food available to buy on the night. Here are the photos from previous years' events to give you a flavour of what to expect.

Tell your friends and get yourself registered!

**Two sponsors confirmed. But we need more to make the party really fly. If you'd like to sponsor and join the fun and get to meet and mingle with the crowd, please get in touch with Helen to discuss. All budgets catered for.** 

See you in Barcelona.

Skål

Helen

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Like us on Facebook http://facebook.com/swedishbeers

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/swedishbeers

This is a Heroes of the Mobile Fringe Festival Event

http://mobileheroes.net/ |  http://swedishbeers.org/

Powered by Eventbrite

There may be a queue to get in at times but we managed to get pretty much everyone in who wanted to last year so please don't be put off! The queue does move quite quickly. All are welcome to attend if you are working in and around the mobile industry and enjoy a good chat. You may be asked for ID on entry. You must be pre-registered to attend the event. We reserve the right to refuse entry.

Swedish Beers - #13 Barcelona Edition, 2018 - Wednesday 28 February

Plans are afoot for the next edition of Swedish Beers in Barcelona in 2018! (Doesn't it come around quickly?!)... We will be in a NEW venue! More on that soon. The format will be just the same - a relaxed evening, no formalities, no presentations. Just come with an open mind, be prepared to see friends old and new, chat, enjoy a drink or three (courtesy of our sponsors) and have yourself a good time all whilst extolling (or not) the virtues of our mobile connected world.

The Swedish Beers crew will be on hand to welcome you as usual and we'll have the friendliest bar staff in town.

**Two sponsors confirmed. More to come. And there's room for more on top of that. If you'd like to sponsor and join the fun, please get in touch with Helen to discuss. All budgets catered for.** 

See you in Barcelona.

Skål

Helen

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Like us on Facebook http://facebook.com/swedishbeers

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/swedishbeers

This is a Heroes of the Mobile Fringe Festival Event

http://mobileheroes.net/ |  http://swedishbeers.org/

Powered by Eventbrite



There may be a queue to get in at times but we usually manage to get pretty much everyone in who wants to so don't be put off! All are welcome to attend if you are working in and around the mobile industry and enjoy a good chat. You may be asked for ID on entry. You must be pre-registered to attend the event. We reserve the right to refuse entry.

Swedish Beers, London - Midsummer Edition - Wednesday 17 June 2015

Yes, it’s just a few days to go until our next party in London. It's coming up for midsummer so it's about time we had another Swedish Beers party. For those of you who were in Barcelona, it's time to relive some of the memories and for those of you who weren't, then it's time to create some memories of your own in London town.

Drinks are courtesy of Buzzcity (mobile advertising specialists and our lead sponsor for the evening), Inspiring Interns (recruitment agency focussed on graduate roles), Fantastic Services (London’s largest cleaning company who are about to launch their cleaning app) and US Tax and Financial Services (there’s nothing these guys don’t know about tax issues for US citizens in the UK or for UK citizens and businesses headed Stateside).

There'll be plenty drinks to go around of both alcoholic and non-alcoholic varieties. There is food available to buy on the night if you haven't had time to grab a bite to eat before you come.

We're back at our favourite London joint, The Nordic Bar, where Swedish Beers began back in 2001 in the mists of mobile time. Doors will be open from 6.15pm and the bar has a late licence until midnight for those of you who want to stay up late on a school night.

If you haven't been before, expect a friendly crowd, lots of chat about mobile, life, the universe and why Swedish Beers is called Swedish Beers. There will also be beer pong (yes, there's a ping pong table) and, of course, refreshments (soft drinks are available and in plentiful supply) courtesy of our lovely sponsors. There will be people from all walks of mobile life there on the night - be that app developers, advertising, media, mobile marketing, handset manufacturers, payment providers, big data, brands, agencies, analysts, journalists, start-ups, veterans, noobs and much more. There have already been a lot of RSVPs on eventbrite already. Why not join them? Come alone or come with a friend but do come.

Date: Wednesday 17 June 2015

Time: 6.15pm until closing

Place: The Nordic Bar, Newman Street, London W1 (nearest tube Tottenham Court Road, Oxford Circus or Goodge Street)

You can RSVP below or over on Facebook. Either way, it’s free to attend.

Powered by Eventbrite

Spread the word and look forward to seeing you all soon.

Skål!

Helen

http://swedishbeers.org
@swedishbeers
http://facebook.com/swedishbeers
This is a Heroes of Mobile event.

Once, twice, three times a party…

Swedish Beers parties galore klaxon alert!

It’s fair to say, I’m a bit busy at the moment but it makes for exciting times and I’m thrilled to bits at the prospect of meeting and hanging with some interesting people. Lots of events coming up, including not one, not two, but three Swedish Beers parties and a mini-Heroes and a client event. And more to come…

Well, they say you can have too much of a good thing, but I’m not so sure when it comes to Swedish Beers! We have Swedish Beers coming to three cities near you in the next few weeks so come on down and join the fun, hang with other people with a passing interest in mobile and enjoy a relaxing evening chewing the fat and putting the mobile world to rights.

New York – 2 May 2013

First up, it’s a last-minute jaunt to the Big Apple. Helen will be there on Thursday 2 May with Lubna, Grace, Becky and Petra lending a hand to ensure you have a good time. Antony and Jerome from Ribot will be sponsoring the first few beers but there’s room for another sponsor if you’re up for it. It’s free to attend and we’d love to see you.

More info and RSVP here http://mobileheroes.net/events/event/swedish-beers-hits-the-big-apple/

While I’m in New York, I’ll be chairing a session for BrandPerfect looking at seamless brand advertising (an impossible dream? we’ll see.) It’s free to attend and includes a lovely tour of the Pencil to Pixel exhibition which I highly recommend having experienced it in London before Christmas. http://brandperfect.org/index.php/events/details?id=8

Berlin – 15 May 2013

Next we’re off to Berlin to take in the culture, enjoy a panel discussion, check out some new mobile start-ups and then finish the day with some cheer from Swedish Beers and our friends at Adeven. Again, we’d love to see another sponsor or two benefit from getting involved (get in touch here) but in the meantime, do join Helen, Russell and Kristina for some Swedish, (well probably German), Beers.

More info and RSVP here  http://mobileheroes.net/events/event/swedish-beers-on-tour-in-berlin/

While I’m in Berlin, I’m also organising a half-day of Heroes of Mobile discussions and demos also on 15 May at Betahaus. Details coming for that very soon. Keep your eyes peeled.

London – 13 June 2013

And it wouldn’t be the Summer if we didn’t have a Swedish Beers bash in our home city of London Town. All we’ve done is reserve the date at our favourite London watering hole, The Nordic Bar, and we’re ready and waiting to get sponsors on board. Helen’s talking to a few already but get in touch if you’d like to join the fun. We just wanted to make sure you had the date saved so we can have a blowout party….

More info and RSVP here: http://mobileheroes.net/events/event/swedish-beers-is-it-summer-yet-party/

There will be further Heroes of Mobile discussion events in London in May and June as well. Watch this space as they say!

Sponsorship and time permitting, I’ll be visiting more cities from Leeds to San Francisco. If you’d like to see Swedish Beers and/or Heroes of Mobile happening in your city and can help make that happen, then let Helen know.

If you’re coming to one of the Swedish Beers parties, please bring a business card with you to get your first beer token. Sponsors will have the rest of the tokens so you’ll need to get chatting with them to get your hands on more. There should be enough to go around!

So spread the word, and come on down for a fun evening with friends old and new. You don’t have to be a mobile expert to join us. All welcome with a passing interest in mobile technology and a cheery disposition!

Skål

Swedish Beers–The Jubilee Edition, London

Following a successful first event in San Francisco, we're ready to hit London Town once again and with it being a time of celebration what with the Jubilee and the Olympics ‘n all, Jenny and I thought it was about time we had another shindig.

It's the usual format - no presentations, no formalities, no sales pitches, no ties - just friendly people chatting about mobile over a beer or three. We're at our usual haunt of the Nordic Bar on Newman Street in London and the doors will be open from 6.30pm onwards.

Of course, we couldn’t run the party without a little help from our friends…

Our lead sponsor this time around is Millennial Media. And if you haven't met them already, they're specialists in premium mobile advertising and have a mobile advertising and data platform. They're a super-friendly bunch and are very knowledgeable too. And as lead sponsor (again! We’re very grateful), they'll have the most beer tokens ;) Look out for Gavin, Stephen and the rest of the team. http://millennialmedia.com/

They'll be ably supported by...

TVGuide.co.uk - they do what it says on the tin and offer a UK TV guide on your computer or mobile device. And it’s the one I use most of all as it’s user-friendly and comprehensive. Lila, Mo and the team will be on hand to tell you more about what's new with them and to talk TV apps with you. http://tvguide.co.uk/

Inspiring Interns - they're a recruitment company specialising in helping companies recruit interns and helping set-up and manage intern programmes. They also have years of experience in the world of mobile and are possibly the loveliest recruitment people out there. Yes, I'm biased, their founder, Ben, is a close friend of mine! Look out for Ben, Benedict, Sam, Charlie for beer tokens. http://inspiringinterns.com/

Swiftkey - Want to type faster on your Android device? Swiftkey is the answer. They won a GSMA award in February and a Webby Award this week so they must be on to something. Joe, Rhod and the team will be on hand to show you how it all works and how many keystrokes you can save yourself. http://swiftkey.net/

If you’re interested in joining these lovely companies as a fellow sponsor, please get in touch with Helen by email.

So to recap:

What - Swedish Beers Mobile Networking
When - 30 May 2012 from 6.30pm
Where - Nordic Bar, Newman Street, London. Nearest tubes are Tottenham Court Road or Goodge Street.

RSVP - (optional) over at Facebook and please bring a business card with you to get your first beer token.

So spread the word, pray for a dry evening so we can use the outside area and come on down for a fun evening with friends old and new. You don’t have to be a mobile expert to join us. All welcome with a passing interest in mobile technology.

Skål
Helen, Jenny and the Swedish Beers crew

**********Keep in touch***********

Email: Just add your email address to the Feedblitz box at the top left and you’ll get our blog posts (and therefore event notices) to your inbox.

Twitter: Follow us at http://www.twitter.com/swedishbeers

Facebook: Like us http://www.facebook.com/SwedishBeers or join the Swedish Beers FB group

Swedish Beers On Tour in San Francisco, 16 May 2012

Not content with holding parties in London and Barcelona for just shy of 11 years, we thought we'd give the West Coast a shot of our Swedish Beers cheer since a few of the gang are in town, including me, Helen Keegan - aka technokitten and chief organiser of Swedish Beers. We’re very excited to hold our inaugural event in such a beautiful city and one where the mobile scene is so active and fast-moving. The mixer will be our usual style - no PowerPoint, no speeches, no formalities, just good people, good chat and good drinks courtesy of our sponsors. And if you’re wondering what the photo is, it’s of the view of the Golden Gate Bridge from the living room of the apartment where I’m staying on this trip!

What: Swedish Beers Mobile Networking
When: Wednesday 16th May 2012 – 6.00pm until we run out of steam
Where: 620 Jones: Jones adjoins one of San Francisco’s stunning historic landmark buildings, built in 1929, just three blocks west of Union Square. Look for the towering blue-steel gates just to the right of the Gaylord Suites at 620 Jones. You can’t miss ‘em. 620 Jones Street, San Francisco, CA 94102. There’s a link to the Google map here.

RSVP: You will be asked for your business card on arrival in exchange for a beer token and then you need to find the sponsors to get more free beer tokens. And it would help us if you wouldn’t mind RSVP’ing on Facebook please so we can get a handle on numbers as it’s our first time here. All welcome. No charge for entry.

About our lovely sponsors:

Our first sponsor are Swedish Beers regulars, the lovely team from Somo. With offices in London, New York, Singapore, LA and San Francisco, Somo is really going places. Expert in all aspects of mobile marketing - be that engagement campaigns, branded apps, creation and management of mobile services, mobile advertising or performance marketing - they can handle it. The founder, Carl Uminski, is in San Francisco at the moment with some of his team so they'll be on hand to share the Swedish Beers vibe with you and will have a few free beer tokens to hand out. http://somoglobal.com/ @somoglobal

Next up is StrikeAd - the world's first demand side platform for mobile advertising. Their West Coast team will be on hand to chew the fat about mobile advertising and how using StrikeAd Fusion makes your life that bit easier when it comes to planning and buying mobile media. Garrett and his colleagues will be on hand to explain all and to hand out beer tokens. http://strikead.com/ @strikead

Mojiva is also joining our merry throng this time around. Mojiva makes your job easier by developing unique, cutting-edge mobile advertising campaigns and monetization strategies for agencies, brand advertisers and publishers around the world and provides a monthly reach of over 1 billion unique devices worldwide, with 270 million of those devices coming from the US. Not bad going, I'd say. Join Brian and his colleagues to find out more. http://mojiva.com @mojiva

If you'd like to join these sponsors and be part of our inaugural event in San Francisco, please get in touch with Helen - swedishbeers@gmail.com

Thank you also to Mario Tapia from GetJar and Mobile Monday Silicon Valley for supporting the event.

See you on 16 May in San Francisco and 30 May in London.

Skål

Helen and the Swedish Beers Crew

**********Keep in touch***********
Email: Just add your email address to the Feedblitz box at the top and you’ll get my blog posts (and therefore event notices) to your inbox.
Twitter: Follow us at http://www.twitter.com/swedishbeers
Facebook: Like us http://www.facebook.com/SwedishBeers or join the group

Swedish Beers–The 10th Birthday Edition–7 Dec 2011

Rather amazingly, Swedish Beers is 10 years old. I can’t quite believe it. I can’t quite believe that I’ve been in one industry that long. I can’t quite believe I’m old enough to have done anything for 10 years! The first Swedish Beers event was in the back of the Nordic Bar (our natural home) and was the brainchild of friend and colleague, Steve Flaherty. He got some of his mates together under the guise of a networking event about technology, put a bit of money behind the bar, courtesy of BT, and a royally good time was had by all and it turned into a regular thing. From the 25 or so people at the first event, we’ve grown somewhat and seen 1000s through the doors and have had parties in London, Sydney and the big one every year – Barcelona during Mobile World Congress. But for our birthday party and a bit of a pre-Christmas bash, we’re back to our old favourite, The Nordic Bar. James and his team will be looking after us.

But of course, it couldn’t happen without the financial support of our lovely sponsors, Somo, and Inspiring Interns and of course, the friendship and support of our friends and regular attendees. It’s all of you who make Swedish Beers what it is today. And for that, I really am grateful.

So back to the birthday bash. It’s the same formula as before – mingle, make friends, talk of mobiles, marketing, life in general, drink beer, talk some more, rinse and repeat. There’s no PowerPoint, no formal speeches, and no agenda. Just come with a smile on your face and be prepared to hang out with everyone from mobilists to marketers, brands, agencies, creatives, media owners, journalists, pundits and more. We hope there’ll be a good mix and friendly faces for you to chew the fat with.

We will have free* house beer, house wine and soft drinks for you courtesy of our lovely sponsors Somo Agency and Inspiring Interns. You’ll have to look for them to get your free beer tokens. There are plenty to go around. *While the bar tab lasts. If we run out of beer tokens and/or the bar tab is spent, then we’ll revert to a pay bar.

What: Swedish Beers Mobile Networking Party – The 10th Birthday Edition

When: Wednesday 7 December 2011 from 6.30pm until 11pm

Where: You'll find us at the Nordic Bar on Newman Street which is the North side of Oxford Street, nearest tube Tottenham Court Road, Oxford Circus or Goodge Street. We’ll be taking over the whole bar and there’s outside space with heaters for those who like to stand outside in the Winter. There’s no need to RSVP, just turn up. If you’re really feeling the need to RSVP somewhere, then you can do that over here https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=265361270178751

Skål

Helen, & the Swedish Beers crew

About the sponsors

Somo

Somo is the leading independent mobile marketing agency. Our mission is to help our clients benefit from the rapidly evolving developments in the mobile market. We do this by identifying the potential that mobile marketing can bring to a client’s business, then designing, building and delivering first class campaigns across all mobile platforms. We use sophisticated reporting and tracking tools to measure the success of campaigns to ensure that, whatever the objectives, they are achieved. Head honcho and very knowledgeable, Carl, and his growing team of experienced mobilistas will be on hand to chew the mobile fat with you and to hand out beer tokens.

Inspiring Interns

Inspiring Interns is today's intern recruitment solution, connecting businesses with fresh graduate talent. We search for talented, intelligent, and motivated young interns who want to learn, grow and importantly make a positive contribution through their skill sets and attitude. Any team, whether it is finance, administration, sales, marketing, HR, design or otherwise will benefit from having an intern as an additional team member.

We screen and interview every potential intern that we put forward for a position. We psychometric test them and ensure that we are dealing with highly motivated as well as talented people. If you want to meet any of our interns now you can perform a search or view via the player on our website. Search out the founders and long time friends of Swedish Beers and technokitten, Ben, Benedict, Sam and Charlie who will be on hand for fun, frolics and beer tokens.

**********Keep in touch***********

Email: Just add your email address to the Feedblitz box at the top left and you’ll get our blog posts (and therefore event notices) to your inbox.

Twitter: Follow us at http://www.twitter.com/swedishbeers

Facebook: Like us http://www.facebook.com/SwedishBeers (we’re phasing out the Swedish Beers FB group)

Events, events and more events

Admittedly I get involved in more events than the average mobile executive, but even so, it's clear that everything is ramping up in preparation for the GSMA's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona next month.

Just to bring you up to speed with some of the stuff I'm working on event-wise in the coming weeks...

Mobile Monday - 2nd February - it's our monthly event and this time we're covering off the Mobile Web - The changing landscape covering everything from widgets to the browser experience. The event is sponsored by Ikivo and OMTP Bondi. The event will be at the CBI at Centrepoint and I'm afraid the RSVP list is currently full. However, we do have a standby list  so it's worth adding your name to it as it's quite likely we'll get drop-outs in the next few days. More details here (registration required).

E-Consultancy - one-day training course on mobile marketing - 3rd February in London. I run only a few public training courses in mobile marketing and this is one of them. We usually have a small group so it means you get lots of opportunity to ask questions and discuss key topics pertinent to the group. The course offers an excellent opportunity for you to gain a better understanding of the opportunities mobile marketing can offer. You will learn a range of techniques to help you plan and execute an effective mobile marketing campaign, including best practice, historical context and insight into current trends and future directions. So if you'd like to come, please book your place. The cost for the day is £545 + VAT.

Amsterdam and the Dutch Cowgirls - this warrants a separate post but I'll be in Amsterdam on 5th and 6th of February.

IDM - Kings College Lecture 9th February. I do an annual evening lecture at Kings College for the Institute of Direct Marketing giving an overview of what's happening in the mobile world. I'm not sure how open it is to the general population, mobile or otherwise, so if you wanted to come to this, it's best to email me about it so that I can ask if I'm allowed to bring any guests.

Which brings us on to Barcelona and Mobile World Congress. I'll do a separate post on this too but suffice to say, there's a lot going on - I'm running a Swedish Beers event, a Women in Mobile Data lunch on the Tuesday and a lunch event for the UKTI/Mobile Monday London on the Wednesday. I'll also be around for Rudy's Mobile Sunday bash, the MoMo Global Peer Awards on Monday evening and Mike Butcher's Techcrunch afternoon on the Thursday. There's also Caroline's MobileJamSession on Thursday too - so somewhat torn. And there's a ton of stuff I want to do inside Congress this year too including some interesting Nokia stuff. Plus I need to try and fit in a visit to La Roca on the Friday. Sheesh.

The following week, I'll be enjoying London Fashion week for a couple of days before heading off to Denmark to hang with the Seismonauts and speak at one of their events in Arhus which I'm *really* looking forward to. (If anyone's in any doubt, I absolutely love Scandinavia!)

Then in March, I'm going on holiday. Hurrah! I'm going to need it by then. Two weeks in sunny Spain on the south coast. Can't wait.

Oh, and on a completely unrelated note, a pal of mine is on Channel 4's Come Dine with Me next week. Go Matt, go!

Technorati Tags: mobile,events,swedish beers,networking,barcelona,mobile world congress,women in mobile data,mobile monday,momo,ukti,e-consultancy,seismonaut

A few links for you

First off, the podcast/videocast of the last MoMo London event is now live courtesy of Clarity Partners. It was a demo night so there are lots of short demos and right at the very end, Roving Reporter Keegan interviews some of the audience to get their reaction. I think I'm right up there with Bridget Jones' roving reporter skills!

Today I was on a panel for the Guardian's Changing Media Summit which was really interesting. I was ably accompanied by Justin Davies from NinetyTen (makers of Buddyping), Tom Hume from Future Platforms and Andrew Scott from Playtxt. In the Jeremy Paxman role was Mike Butcher of Vecosys and he also blogs about the event here. I'm pleased to say that we didn't use powerpoint (good thing) but the session seemed to absolutely whizz by without covering topics in enough depth so I left feeling I could have said a lot more (well, we all did actually). Jemima Kiss has blogged about our session over at the Guardian and I believe the event was filmed so if those films ever make it into the wild, I'll let you know. There are good write-ups of all the sessions in the Greenslade section of the Guardian website. Go see what you missed.

I just stumbled across this directory of web 2.0 services including a section on mobile. Might be worth checking out and adding to it if you know of a service that should be up there. There are certainly some interesting links up there.

And well done to Alfie, JC and Ben at Moblog for their Channel 4 deal for 'The Big Art Mob'. It's a really interesting project whereby anyone can send in pictures from their mobile of 'art' in their area, whether that's graffiti or statue or whatever. And they're using location tagging to create a map of where the art can be seen. Looks pretty cool to me. Go check out the Vecosys sneak preview of it. This follows hot on the heels of Moblog's support for the recent Red Nose Day.

I know there's more to write about - I have a backlog as long as your arm, but being busy on client stuff, sorting out the next WiMD (28th March) and Swedish Beers events (11th April), still suffering from a post-3GSM lurgy and generally trying to live life has meant I haven't been as giving as usual on the blog front. I will try to do better in the coming weeks!