Lugano Tech Talks January 2026 Meetup

WE ARE STARTING 30 MINUTES EARLIER THAN USUAL!

• 6:30 pm: Doors open and mingling

• 7:00 pm: Talks

Deb Shaw - How AI gives your startup superpowers: lessons from TiltFolio

AI has radically lowered the cost of building startups, but it hasn’t replaced human judgment. Based on experience in venture capital and building an AI-powered startup, this talk explores where AI truly accelerates product and marketing, and where it fails. The durable advantage in an AI-saturated world is in human intuition, trust, and emotional resonance. The founders who win today will be those who combine AI with distinctly human strengths.

Matteo Hessel - Learning to learn with Reinforcement Learning

Humans and other animals use powerful reinforcement learning (RL) mechanisms that have been discovered by evolution over many generations of trial and error. In contrast, AI systems typically learn using simple handcrafted learning rules, manually designed by human experts. We present DiscoRL, the first AI-discovered general algorithm for learning to act in a variety of complex novel environments. We discuss the key engineering and algorithmic solutions that allowed us to use Reinforcement Learning to discover this new algorithm and some possible implications for AI development going forward.

• 8:00 pm: Beers and pizzas served. Socialize with fellow members and share thoughts and ideas!

• 9:00 pm: End of meetup.

THE VENUE

Bloomberg LP has kindly agreed to host us at their office in Lugano. There will be a reception after the talks for some great networking opportunities.

For security reasons, access to the venue can be granted upon generation of a visitor badge. Please answer the extra question on the RSVP with your full name.

Please make sure you specify your real name, as Bloomberg's security procedures require that you are entered in the system in advance.
Please, in case you bring a guest with you don’t forget to indicate the name of the guest in the comments.

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Please note that no walk-ins will be allowed.