The conference that will help you expand your horizons as a woman in business in 2026

As I look back on the events I have been lucky to attend this year, as a freelance journalist, I have to admit one of my favourites is the IT Arena conference in Lviv, Ukraine. You might think that going to an event in a war-torn country would be the last thing on the agenda of a tech journalist but it has become an annual trip for me and a few of my fellow journalists who are lucky to be invited by the Lviv IT Cluster.

This was my fourth year in attendance. I had never been to Ukraine before Russia’s full scale invasion in February 2022 but when I got the call up to head to a tech event in September 2022 I’ll admit I was curious at how they would host such an event during such times – also knowing only a small bit about the Ukrainian tech scene at the time I was keen to learn more.

The first IT Arena held during Russia’s full-scale invasion was a very scaled-down affair, and for us few journalists who got bussed across the border from Poland, it was a sobering affair. The border crossing in itself back then was hectic, people leaving in their droves and security was extra tight on who they let in.

That year, we had a Belarusian woman with us; she was attached to a Polish-Ukrainian start-up programme, yet her passport had us held up for hours as we awaited her fate. I believe that might have been the moment that the glue dried on our little group and ever since, that group of journalists, me and four guys from different corners of Europe, became fast friends.

The other thing that cemented that bond was the realisation that we had just landed at a tech conference which, for that year, was all based around defence tech. It was surreal to be sitting in press conferences with Ukrainian government officials and drone company founders listening to them discuss the escalating war and the innovation that would save lives on the battlefield, but also take lives too.

Many of the people in PR created a collective called the PR Army to support the stories coming out of Ukraine, dissolving the disinformation being spread by their Russian counterparts. Many of them are working two jobs to get the messages out there, sitting in bathtubs instead of at a desk to keep the work going throughout missile attacks and blackouts.

Tech founders had moved into the west of the country to keep their enterprises afloat, to support the war effort or keep the economy ticking over, many of whom have become good friends of mine over the past few years. Our annual trip to Ukraine serves as a good catch-up to see how their lives are progressing.

These people are resilient, and if the only thing you get from attending an IT Arena conference is inspiration, then it is worth it. The conversations are humbling, the pitches are inspiring and the innovation is impressive.

This year’s winner of the start-up competition’s general category was Ovul, a fertility and hormone health tracker based on saliva sample analysis. Second place went to Heft, a health and fertility monitoring system for cows and the third place went to StackBob, an AI platform for employee identity and access management, automating onboarding, offboarding and handling passwords and licenses. Not the typical companies you might think of, at the moment, when Ukraine is mentioned, due to all the defence tech chatter and news headlines.

It’s possibly slightly irresponsible of me to ‘recommend’ a conference in Ukraine right now. Lviv is considered the safest option as a city in the west but a week after returning from my last trip, the city was heavily hit by a Russian missile attack. So, I have an alternative to recommend. In 2026, IT Arena is expanding globally and we will see its first international edition in Warsaw, Poland, on May 15 and 16, 2026. There are five stages: Main stage Tech, Dual-Use, Startup, and Business, so there are plenty of talks to choose from.

Did you make a deal with yourself to expand your horizons as a founder or woman in business in 2026? Well, this might just be your chance to get inspired by other business cultures, build out your network, and if you are feeling really bold, try to snag a speaker spot on stage!