Valencia has long been celebrated for its food, beaches, festivals and quality of life. According to Forbes, Valencia was once again  named the best city to live in the world in the 2024.  The city earns high marks in the quality of life index, ranking first overall. But a quieter revolution is also underway – one measured not in paellas or fireworks, but in business ideas, prototypes and pitch decks. On June 12–14, Las Naves, the city’s flagship innovation hub, will host Techstars Startup Weekend Valencia: a 54-hour entrepreneurship event backed by one of the most powerful startup networks on the planet. 

We sat down with Oki Alexander, the Lead Organiser behind it, to find out what it means for Valencia and why now.

24/7 VALENCIA: OKI, TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOURSELF. WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO VALENCIA AND TO THIS PROJECT?

Oki Alexander: I came to Valencia the way a lot of people do, drawn by the lifestyle, the energy, the fact that it somehow manages to feel both relaxed and alive at the same time. I also saw a lot of similarities in energy between where I was living before, Shanghai in the early 2000s, and Valencia: a city with enormous entrepreneurial potential that the world just hadn’t discovered yet. There’s real talent here that becomes tangible at many different levels: including the universities, the coworking spaces, organizations like Lanzadera and Startup Valencia, and in the conversations you have at any café in Ruzafa, Cabanyal or El Carmen. I wanted to do something to channel that and Techstars Startup Weekend Valencia felt like the right vehicle to make it happen.

24/7 VALENCIA: FOR OUR READERS WHO MAY NOT BE FAMILIAR, WHAT EXACTLY IS ‘TECHSTARS STARTUP WEEKEND’ AND WHAT CAN SOMEONE EXPECT IF THEY ATTEND?

Oki Alexander: Think of it as the most productive weekend of your life! You arrive on Friday evening, pitch an idea if you have one, or join someone else’s team if you don’t, and then over 54 hours, you go from idea to a working prototype, with successful startup founders as mentors,  real-time feedback and a presentation to a panel of angel investors by Sunday night.

What makes it special is the Techstars methodology. It’s not theoretical. You’re not sitting in a classroom listening to lectures about entrepreneurship. You’re doing it. You’re talking to potential customers on Saturday morning, refining your model by Saturday afternoon and presenting a real pitch by Sunday. It’s intense, it’s exhilarating and it changes how people think about what’s possible.

And crucially, you don’t need an idea to come to the event. You don’t need to be a developer or a designer or an established entrepreneur. You just need curiosity and a willingness to work hard on an idea for a weekend. We’ll take care of the rest.

24/7 VALENCIA: SO IS THIS A HACKATHON? WHAT SHOULD PARTICIPANTS REALISTICALLY EXPECT TO GET OUT OF THE WEEKEND?

Oki Alexander: Startup Weekend is fundamentally an educational event, not a hackathon. We are not aiming to dive deep into coding or produce a fully operational product; it’s a way to give people a genuine taste of what entrepreneurship involves, using the same tools and methodology that real founders use: the business model canvas, the value proposition canvas, and talking to customers before you build anything.

I sometimes compare starting a company from a Startup Weekend to speed dating for marriage. You’re building a team with strangers over 54 hours, which isn’t always an ideal foundation for a long-term business partnership. I’d rather participants walk away with the methodology in their heads, genuinely inspired, and then go and find the right partners and apply those learnings in the real world. That’s the more honest path.

There may be success stories (like Zaarly being one of the most cited) but those are the exception, not the rule. I think it does a disservice to participants to lead with them. If you arrive expecting to leave as a funded entrepreneur, you’ll likely be disappointed. If you arrive wanting to learn what it actually takes to go from idea to MVP to pitch, and to find out whether entrepreneurship is something you want to pursue, then you’ll leave with exactly that.

24/7 VALENCIA: THE EVENT IS IN ENGLISH. WHY IS THAT AND WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR VALENCIA’S INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY?

Oki Alexander: English is the language of the global startup world. If you want to raise investment from a US, UK or global fund, pitch at a European accelerator, or attract an international co-founder, you need to be able to tell your story clearly and compellingly in English.

One of the things we hear again and again from Spanish entrepreneurs is that they have brilliant ideas but they freeze the moment they have to pitch in English. It’s not a language barrier so much as a confidence barrier. There’s a fear of making mistakes, of not sounding professional, of being judged.

This event is a safe space to practice all of that. The stakes are real enough to feel meaningful (because you’re pitching to actual judges with actual industry experience) but low enough that failing is part of the process. You’re surrounded by peers who are all in the same boat. And by Sunday, something shifts. People who walked in terrified of speaking English in front of a room, walk out having done exactly that and realising it wasn’t as scary as they thought.

For the expat and international community here, it’s also a fantastic entry point. Valencia has thousands of people from the UK, the US, Germany, the Netherlands. These are people who have built careers elsewhere and moved here for the lifestyle. Many of them have skills, ideas and ambition. This gives them a community to plug into and a structured way to explore entrepreneurship in their adopted city.

24/7 VALENCIA: VALENCIA HAS A REPUTATION AS A GREAT PLACE TO LIVE. BUT IS IT ALSO A GREAT PLACE TO BUILD A BUSINESS?

Oki Alexander: That’s the question I find most exciting. The honest answer is: it has every ingredient to be one of Europe’s great startup cities, yet it’s still flying under the radar which is actually an opportunity in itself.

You have three world-class universities producing exceptional engineering and business graduates. You have a growing base of international talent attracted by the quality of life and the cost of living. You have strong municipal support – in our case, the city’s Ayuntamiento through Councillor Paula Llobet – genuinely committed to building the innovation ecosystem here. And you have Las Naves, València Innovation Centre, which is one of the best innovation spaces I’ve seen anywhere in Europe.

Something else to take into account is that cities like Bilbao, Malaga and Valencia are competing to become the next startup hub. This drives regulation and investment from the government side and we believe that Valencia is leading in this area. We want to be positioned early on in the wave that is to come. 

What’s been missing is a real focus on internationalisation, something that signals to the outside world that Valencia is open for business and investment in the startup world. That’s part of what we’re trying to add to the existing startup ecosystem.

24/7 VALENCIA: BEYOND THE EVENT ITSELF, WHAT’S THE BIGGER VISION? WHERE DO YOU SEE THIS GOING?

Oki Alexander: This Startup Weekend is the beginning of something much larger. The long-term goal is to make Valencia an official Techstars City, unlocking its pre-accelerator program and world-class education, mentors and bringing a Techstars Accelerator with its full investment fund and global network to Valencia. Techstars has backed more than 5,000 companies worldwide with a combined market cap exceeding $133 billion. That could open some exciting doors for founders here in Valencia.

But you don’t get a Techstars Accelerator by simply asking nicely. You build towards it. You demonstrate that there’s a community of talented, ambitious founders here. You show that the city can sustain world-class entrepreneurship events. You build the pipeline. That’s what we’re doing on June 12th with the help of the city’s existing startup community.

I genuinely believe that Valencia is ready. There’s a vibrancy and an energy in this city that is similar to where I saw China all those years ago. People here want to build great things. We’re just helping provide a global structure to do it.

24/7 VALENCIA: FINALLY — WHO SHOULD COME TO THIS EVENT? GIVE US YOUR PITCH.

Oki Alexander: If you’ve ever had an idea you didn’t know what to do with, come! If you’re a developer or a designer who wants to work on something meaningful for a weekend, come! Honestly, it’s an event that benefits people from all walks of life, including those who have moved to Valencia from another country, or are rebuilding their professional identity or a student who wants to see what entrepreneurship actually feels like before committing to it.

The only requirement is that you show up ready to work, ready to collaborate, and ready to be surprised by what you’re capable of. The rest, we’ll figure out together.

Early bird tickets of €45 have been extended until May 15. Tickets cover the full three days, all meals, mentorship, potential prizes and a community that I think will genuinely change how you see what’s possible in this city.

Techstars Startup Weekend Valencia takes place June 12–14, 2026 at Las Naves. Tickets and information at startupweekendvalencia.com. Follow the event on social media for updates.

Interview conducted by ’24/7 Valencia’ team

All responses represent the views of Oki Alexander in his capacity as Lead Organiser of TSW Valencia.

Article copyright ’24/7 Valencia’