Congratulations to top digital influencers

Juliane Hennig

Who are the people to watch in 2013? We asked our NEXT Community and a jury of experts to make their choices out of 300 nominees. And here it is: our NEXT 100!

NEXT Berlin always looks for new trends in the digital industry. Over the past three months  we’ve been searching for the NEXT 100, the one hundred people who will be digital trendsetters in the near future. Our community nominated and voted for their favourites, and a jury of digital experts debated the list and awarded their own points. The accumulated points of both sets of votes (ratio 1:2) decided the NEXT 100 of 2013.

With Jan Beckers from HitFox in pole position, the list reveals a cross section of the digital industry. Pioneers, founders, bloggers, thought leaders, VCs and tech enthusiasts – all are found among the NEXT 100.

 This is the Top Ten:

  1. Jan  Beckers
  2. Dominik Matyka
  3. Tom  Kedor
  4. Jeff  Jarvis
  5. Gunter  Dueck
  6. Torsten Oelke
  7. Jess  Erickson
  8. Mikael  Pawlo
  9. Joana  Picq & Sven  Külper
  10. Jascha  Samadi

Despite having only just turned 30, Jan Beckers has founded six online start-ups like SponsorPay and Madvertise within the last 10 years, and created 400 jobs along the way. His current project, HitFox, is an incubator for games distribution worldwide. He is also an investor and is engaged in many social projects. He has initiated charity events and raised money for a school in Africa.

Multi-talented Jess Erickson is the highest ranked woman in the NEXT100. She grew up in Minnesota, USA, but has been part of Berlin’s start-up scene for many years now. She founded the ‘Berlin Geekettes’, a fast growing group of women heavily involved in tech. She studied in the US, South Korea and London before coming to Berlin to work at 6Wunderkinder. She currently works as a Producer for General Assembly Berlin and will be on stage at NEXT13 several times. Don’t miss her workshop!

As of today, nearly half of the NEXT 100 have registered and will attend NEXT 13. On the first day of the conference, jury member Colette Ballou (Ballou PR) will introduce the NEXT 100 on the Dome Stage. A number of them will also give ignite talks there.

Meet the digital influencers at NEXT Berlin and get your tickets here.

Read more about the top ten at t3n magazine (in German).

The Jury members: