Words by Helena Flack — right off the plane from ETHIndia

How our sponsorship deck looked like

Anyone who has ever been to an event will know that to pull off the best event possible requires them dollars, I mean ETH. So a massive shout out to all the amazing projects we are collaborating with, that we had to beg to the point where they got so sick of us and were like, “take our damn ETH!”.

Without you guys we wouldn’t be able to execute the high quality hackathon that awaits you all in September. We wouldn’t be able to troll the likes of Lane and Dean (who is still technically banned), MP wouldn’t be meme-ing away and the ETH world would be bored af and of course, Shasper McShardface wouldn’t exist. You’ll be thanking US after when we make an impact together. No really, you will.

In our last post we were unapologetic about how we wanted to create an event that, “No amount of money can get you on that stage. This is an educational event, content-based, for hackers and there is no way to waiver this.”

We were OVERWHELMED by how much of the community shared our vision and wanted to support it. 76. Yes, you read correctly, we received 76 amazing and interesting abstracts for the coveted ETHBerlin speaking slots from all walks of the decentralized world. And even though some are also sponsors, our decision was entirely based on the content of their talks, while trying to provide a different and diverse opening ceremony.

We stuck to our words. We wanted to create a kick-ass event. Guess what?! It’s gonna be even better than you could have imagined. No… sorry Carlos Matos won’t be the opening keynote and John McAffee won’t be announcing the winning projects.

We also wanted to give the projects a chance to provide their ideas to customize their experiences, that they are also coming to mentor and even hack, they are fully immersed into every aspect of the hackathon, because this is how we all want it to happen. This hackathon is not ownerless: it belongs to every participant.

Therefore, we at ETHBerlin are REALLY PROUD to have some of the best projects in the space on board ready to #BUIDL and #HAKC. We want to thank ALL our wonderful sponsors for helping us make this happen. Without you all ETHBerlin would be soulless and hungry. Truth is, that as the event has no single owners, and we are a collective of individuals working on a volunteer basis, we needed financial help. If something goes wrong, we simply don’t have a company back-up. But now our budget is coming together and all these exciting projects, VCs and more are coming to the rescue of the decentralized vision.

To introduce some of them we asked them why they are excited to be part of the ETHBerlin mission, and the biggest hackathon this city has ever seen… and here is what they said (In no particular order)!

Drumroll please.. or whatever works — we like noise!

First up we have MakerDAO who are ready to disrupt! “The Maker team can’t wait to collaborate with the super talented hackers, projects, and thought leaders that make up the Berlin blockchain community. Maker is thrilled to sponsor a bounty at ETHBerlin. We’re most excited to see how Maker and this diverse group of thinkers can work together to disrupt and revolutionize finance.”

These events are here to help our ecosystem grow and improve. Colony said they are most excited because, “Inducting exciting new talent is critical to the health and vitality of the Ethereum ecosystem. It’s a privilege to be able to support initiatives like ETHBerlin which play such an important role in encouraging smart, enthusiastic new minds to join our community.”

We love how our mantra about attracting only the hardcore to the event is something that AdEx shares too, “ETHBerlin will attract some of the most talented members of the community and we are very excited to connect with everyone. It would be super cool to showcase the AdEx progress to a group of hardcore Ethereum developers and get their feedback.”

Zk Capital are all about innovation, innovation, innovation. Imran tells us they are most looking forward to coming because “We see an opportunity to be at the forefront of innovation by directly working alongside developers, creators, and leaders. In order to increase momentum, our very own Raul Jordan and Dr. El Seidy will be onsite mentoring and be speaking at the event. We are incredibly excited to support the ETH Berlin team!”

Golem has been with us from day 0 — after all the hackathon was created during a friends’ in their Berlin, so they have a lot to say: “We are super proud of have — unadvertedly, yet we are happy to be part of the hacktivism! — lent our space for the birth of this massive event. We’ve seen it progress throughout these months and we are very excited to take part. Our team is now reaching out to devs wanting to build on top of Golem, and even if this is at its very initial stages, ETHBerlin is the perfect place to start digging Githubs and reaching out to builders.”

0x can’t wait for the community vibes, because let’s face it — Ethereum is all about this awesome community we have built together! Another one of our sponsors state, “0x is excited about sponsoring ETHBerlin because we love the Ethereum community. We are excited to share what we have learned since EthDenver, and can’t wait to learn what other community members have been thinking about. Come say hi at the conference.”

DAOStack said they are most excited about being there to #BUIDL, “Shilling free events are a rare find and we look forward to foster real collaboration and #BUIDL with hackers and projects interested in decentralized governance, DAOs, DApps and platform interoperability. Part of our team has been working on those subjects since the early days of Ethereum and supporting hackers with mentorship while continuing to learn with the community is always an incredibly valuable part of hackathons. We are especially excited to invite others to hack the Genesis DAO and to improve the DAO ecosystems in general.”

Another project we are proud to have on board is Ambrosus. They are all over it because they are proud of their roots in the Ethereum Ecosystem and they are, “looking forward to provide developers with all the tooling and development kits to enable sensors to talk to blockchain and unleash the limitless creativity of Dapps powered by IoT devices.”

Our awesome friends over at the Ethereum Community Fund are jumping on board because not only are they committed to helping the blockchain ecosystem improve and grow sustainably but they are excited to, “connect with developers across the world: find out what drives them, what are they building, which are the pain points and challenges they experience and find avenues to help them out while growing community. We are deeply committed to Open Source development, and the tireless builders behind this: so we are looking forward to introducing everyone to our Fund and let them know that grants are not solemn, but a reward and a pledge for their hard work.”

Then you have some projects that are just coming for the memes, yes we are pointing at you Ziggy from POA… “Berlin is the blockchain capital of the world, so it only makes sense that ETHBerlin will be the most anticipated ETHGlobal event this year! We can’t wait for all the amazing workshops, meet great people and laugh at the incredible memes curated by MP!”

And last but not least for this round of sponsor intros, the reason why our techie friends, Centrifuge are super happy to be joining the event, “because it is the only place where Crypto Kitties hang out with real people.” That’s a legit reason. We will even have our very own Cat Lady in the house who may or may not show us his kitties if we’re lucky!

Well this was only part one of our sponsor intro! We have so many we had to spread them out a bit so stay tuned as we will be introducing more of our amazing friends in the upcoming weeks! Big shout out to every single one of you for joining the ETHBerlin movement. Let the games begin!