He invented modern social media, then had it stolen from him. So how does Evan Spiegel feel about it, and how will he turn Snapchat’s product leadership into a profitable business? We’ll bring you the answers at TechCrunch Disrupt SF, where Snap CEO Evan Spiegel will join us. Come learn how Spiegel analyzes behavior to create new features, evolves from failure and keeps his brand cool.

The talk comes at a pivotal time for Snap, just as it hopes to hit profitability. After 2.5 years of being ruthlessly copied while trying to maintain the moral high ground, Snapchat is finally fighting back against Mark Zuckerberg’s army of clones. Snapchat has a smart new platform strategy that will bring its Stories and vertical video ads to other apps. The goal is to unite the independent social web from Tinder to Houseparty into a rebel alliance. By colonizing the app ecosystem, Snap could revive growth and juice its revenue.

How does Spiegel devise his battle plans? What took Snap so long to respond to Facebook’s competition? And what advice does he have for other founders duking it out with well-funded rivals? Our talk will have plenty of tactical insights for anyone roadmapping their company’s future.

However, it’s not competition, but missteps and stagnation that most often kill startups. From a disastrous redesign to neglect of international teens, Snapchat has made plenty of unforced errors. But it’s finally proving willing to correct course. It’s been fixing its design and feature set while reengineering its Android app for the developing world. We’ll discuss what it takes for a CEO to admit they’re wrong without destroying morale, and how to make things right even if the process takes years.

Spiegel and Snapchat have proven the longevity of owning a core tech use case like messaging. Now it faces the challenge of monetizing our habits without annoying us. And if Snap can survive long enough while funding augmented reality hardware R&D, it could emerge a power player in the next era of computing. We’ll ask Spiegel how he balances capitalizing on today’s trends with playing the long game against giants like Apple.

It’s been an interesting few years since we last spoke to Spiegel on the Disrupt stage, and we’re excited to hear what’s next for Snap. Tickets to Disrupt, which runs October 2 to October 4 in San Francisco, are available here.

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