LAUNCH (digital media)

LAUNCH Scale is our 2 day conference based in San Francisco, California. This conference is designed for founders (free) to help them scale their businesses. We feature fireside & tactical talks throughout the two days, to help founders gain actionable insights that help scale their operations. In previous years, we've had founders, executives, and investors in some of the fastest growing startups: Calm, Twitter, Allbirds, Pinterest, Superhuman, Nextdoor, Fitbod, and more. Learn more here

LAUNCH Festival, hosted by angel investor, serial entrepreneur, “ANGEL” author, and podcaster, Jason Calacanis, is a celebration of entrepreneurship and innovation. For the past 10 years, we’ve hosted Festival in San Francisco, featuring fireside chats with Silicon Valley technologists and pioneers, demonstrations of cutting-edge future tech, and exciting startup competitions with founders and teams from all around the world. Learn more here

Investor-related content, memorable dining experiences, engaging activities and late-night poker and networking. During two days of content, you’ll hear from some of the best in the business. Previous speakers include David Sacks, Cyan Banister and Ester Dyson. Learn more here

Founder University is a two-day curriculum for founders who have launched their product. Available to 60 founders selected based on merit. The class is free of charge for the accepted founders. Only one founder per startup can attend. Learn more here.

A workshop for individuals interested in becoming professional angel investors. The curriculum is designed for angels who have done 0 to 100 angel investments and focuses on five key topics: sourcing deals, evaluating startups, negotiating deals, portfolio and bankroll management, and post-deal efforts. Learn more here

Jason Calacanis and a rotating group of guest experts bring you this weekly take on the best, worst, most outrageous and interesting stories from the world of entrepreneurship. Calacanis, a podcasting pioneer, gives you an insider’s look at what’s happening in the tech industry with his trademark blunt style and good humor. Looking to start your own company? Need strategies for improving your business of motivating your team? Just want to catch up on what’s happening in Silicon Valley and beyond? Your journey begins here.

Jason Calacanis interviews the greatest angel investors on earth. Listen here.

The LAUNCH Accelerator selects 7 startups for each session. Program participants meet every Thursday and hear from a notable speaker and pitch top Silicon Valley investors. The LAUNCH team selects founders who are executing at an extremely high level in markets that are important. We look for world-class product design, traction, revenue, and technical execution -- said simply, people with skills and products that people love. We seek individuals who are deeply passionate and who possess a tremendous work ethic.

All of the founders we accept have a solid product in market. At least half of the startups we accept have significant traction and revenue. We do not invest in business plans, decks, or ideas -- ever. Occasionally we will accept a wildcard who has an MVP but little or no traction.

Our mission at LAUNCH has always been to support founders and inspire innovation. Since 2009 (the year our founder Jason Calacanis started this conference in Silicon Valley), we've had the great pleasure of providing value to the startups & founders that we come across. The value comes in many different forms, such as:

Funding: By hosting events, we’re able to meet founders of many amazing startups that we often invite to our accelerator in San Francisco, and invest hundreds of thousands of dollars into them. To date, we've invested in over 200 startups. Our notable investments include Uber, Robinhood, Thumbtack, Desktop Metal, Wealthfront, DataStax, Calm, Tumblr, Trello.

Education: We’ve been hosting a 2x weekly podcast called This Week In Startups with 60M+ downloads, and have brought on guests such as Ev Williams, Chris Sacca, Chamath Palihapitiya, Patty McCord, Brit Morin, Esther Dyson, David Sacks & many more notable founders and investors.w: