Gloucestershire Tech Week 2026: innovation for society's biggest challenges
Five days exploring technology, innovation and our changing world, where founders, innovators, disruptors, leaders & learners come together to turn the county's tech strengths into solutions for society's biggest challenges.
The county's call to action
We are living through an era of radical uncertainty, a world of confrontation, competition and cooperation, in which technology is more crucial than ever. Gloucestershire Tech Week exists to convene the people who can navigate this era: innovators, businesses, investors, universities and government, working side by side around the technologies that will shape both the UK's security and prosperity. Our role is to turn the challenges the country faces into shared opportunities here in Gloucestershire.
The challenges
National context
Seven national challenges drawn from the UK's National Security Strategy and Strategic Defence Review.
Helping the country and its organisations cope with and recover quickly from shocks, from cyber-attacks to supply chain issues.
Making sure Britain can design, build and control the technologies it can't afford to depend on others for.
Developing genuinely leading-edge technology that gives the UK a distinctive edge. This includes capability that sets us apart rather than simply keeping pace.
Creating, testing and adopting new technology in months, not years.
Building the people, training and expertise that new technology depends on.
Treating security and resilience as a shared effort across the whole of society.
Being ready across the technological domains that increasingly decide modern security.
Themes
The Programme
Each day takes a different theme and explores a selection of the national challenges through it. Dive into the full schedule on the programme page.
See the full programme
BEYOND THE WEEK
The week is the start, not the point
Everything in the programme comes back to the seven national challenges. They will not be solved in five days. So we have set out twelve ways to act on them after the week ends, from mentoring and building skills to investing and starting something new.