The Global Entrepreneurship Conference 2012–Helping entrepreneurs stand on their own two feet

Ingrid VanderVeldt with Richard Branson - GEC 2012

After spending a weekend in Liverpool for the GEC Conference, I’ve finally had time to reflect on what a truly incredible and inspiring experience it was. At GEC 2012, there were entrepreneurs and students from all over the world who invested their time and energy to be in one place to promote global entrepreneurship…over 3000 entrepreneurs and 130 countries were represented! It was an honor to go there with Dell and we had such a great time showing off the new Dell XPS Laptop.

GEC 2012 was organized by the Kaufmann Foundation and also sponsored by Liverpool Vision and Global Entrepreneurship Week. The Kaufmann Foundation’s goal is to focus on forwarding global entrepreneurship by collaborating with world leaders and business owners. Everyone there took seriously the fact that entrepreneurs are the ones creating new jobs and they are the ones that will change the world with their passion, drive, and hard work.

Here’s a quick video overview of The Global Entrepreneurship Conference 2012 and Dell’s role in it:

The event was truly a melting pot of amazing minds – You could walk around the conference and meet Richard Branson (@richardbranson), Sir Global Entrepreneurship Conference 2012 - LiverpoolTerry Leahy, Martha Lane Fox (@marthalanefox), Lord Heseltine, Steve Felice of Dell (@sjfeliceatdell), Jonathon Ortmann (@ortmans) and even the Mayor of Liverpool. It was so cool to hear Richard Branson talk about how fantastic it is that Dell is helping entrepreneurs out.

And not only did I get to meet incredible business leaders from around the world, but I also got to meet the UK Dell team! I loved meeting them and it made the world seem even more like a community. It made a global corporation seem like “I have friends in Liverpool…in the UK… that I can call because Dell brought it together!”

On a personal note – I got to go to The Cavern Club – the intimate club where the Beatles started their whole career! Being in Liverpool really was an amazing and inspiring experience.

In the coming weeks, I’ll have more blogs from the GEC Conference posted on the Dell EIR site and I’ll go into more detail with some of the amazing entrepreneurs I got to meet and interview – including Steve Felice, president and chief commercial officer for Dell, Abdulha from Nigeria, Ashok Rao, global chairman of TIE (one of the largest entrepreneur organizations in the world), and Raj Dey, co-founder of Startup Britain.

About the Author: Ingrid Vanderveldt