SXSW London announces first speakers for 2026 festival, including experts and change makers in business, technology and culture

Early speaker highlights for 2026 include: 

• Ben Cohen, Co-Founder of Ben & Jerry's, whose campaign to free his socially oriented brand from Unilever, has been at the forefront of a global debate on how social mission still lies at the heart of commercial success. 

• Thomas Cwik, Chief Technologist at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), whose work in space also generates new opportunities on Earth. 

• Ioannis Antonoglou, Co-Founder & CTO of Reflection AI, whose groundbreaking work on autonomous coding agents garnered a recent 2B£ investment to accelerate AGI and superintelligence. 

SXSW London uniquely celebrates high profile leaders, who are also domain experts. This means that the 2026 edition will deepen the festival's promise to deliver distinctive and material insights to leaders looking for ways to build a new and better future.  

The highly curated list of speakers at SXSW London 2026 is paired with a longstanding open submissions process, allowing the public to actively participate in and engage with the festival. In this way, SXSW London creates incremental opportunities for attendees to discover new talent.  

A comprehensive list of speakers along with talent from the worlds of music, film, television and the visual arts will be released in early 2026. 

2026 SPEAKERS AND CONFERENCE TRACKS 

Following the announcement of our 15 new 2026 tracks, the below speakers, all leaders in their fields, bring world class expertise to our program.  

Change Makers 

• Ben Cohen, Co-Founder of Ben & Jerry's and storied activist - exploring the legacy of the values-driven company he founded over 47 years ago, as well as his recent campaign to restore the brand's independence from its parent company, Unilever. 

• Thomas Cwik, Chief Technologist, NASA JPL – exploring his decades of knowledge in strategic thinking about robotic space exploration and climate change.   

AI and the New Human Experience  

• Ioannis Antonoglou, Co-Founder and CTO, Reflection AI – exploring radical technical and philosophical approaches to AI systems.  

• Sviat Dulianinov, CEO, Bright Machines – exploring future manufacturing, the convergence of tech & industry, and how cities can adapt to emerging infrastructure trends. 

• Joleen Liang, CEO of Squirrel AI North America and Co-Founder, Squirrel AI – exploring AI, Education and EdTech. 

• Josh Payne, CEO Nscale – a UK hyperscaler building sovereign GPU-native AI infrastructure and a key partner of Stargate UK, making him highly relevant to the UK's emerging AI and compute ecosystem. 

• Victor Riparbelli, CEO & Co-Founder, Synthesia – exploring the future of video. 

Design 

• Hovhannes Avoyan, Founder & CEO, Picsart – exploring his vision for empowering millions of users to design, edit and share visual content globally; offering first-hand insight on launching a worldwide product. 

Frontier Technologies 

• Dr. Stephanie Kuku, Chief Knowledge Officer, Conceivable Life Sciences – exploring Health Tech and the ethics of AI 

• Gloria Mark, Chancellor's Professor of Informatics, University of California Irvine – exploring Human–computer interaction, digital wellbeing, and technology's impact on mental health. 

• Ashley Pilipiszyn, CEO and Founder, BESXAR - exploring the deep link between semiconductor innovation and the acceleration of AI.. 

Marketing and Advertising 

• Cristina Diezhandino, CMO, Diageo – exploring digital marketing, data-driven consumer insights and innovation. 

• Jamie Laing, Founder, Candy Kittens, Jampot Productions & Tuckshop and Ed Sweet-Williams, CEO, Candy Kittens – exploring brand strategy and innovation. 

• Martin Sorrell, Founder & Executive Chairman, S4 Capital – exploring the reinvention of marketing in the age of AI and automation. 
   

Society Rewired 

• Lotte Wubben-Moy, Footballer, Arsenal – exploring women in leadership, and the intersection of sports and culture. 

Venture 

• Harry Stebbings, CEO, 20VC – exploring the future of Venture Capital. 

This first announcement demonstrates SXSW London's bold curatorial approach, where leaders shaping the future of business, technology and culture come together to make big moments. The dynamic agenda promises to challenge conventions and, through a unique convergence of topics, inspire collaboration across industries.  

TICKETS 
Tickets are available via website: sxswlondon.com