A one-day community conference at Sofia Tech Park, covering artificial intelligence, automation, and the Internet of Things in industrial and business contexts, with 3 parallel tracks, local and international speakers, and tickets via Eventbrite.
AI Industrial Summit, presented for 2026 under the subtitle "AI Next", is an annual one-day community conference in Sofia organised by the Bulgarian Software Community. It grew out of the IoT Bulgaria Summit, which ran in 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019, before the programme was extended with AI content and rebranded from 2022. The event focuses on practical applications of artificial intelligence, automation, and the Internet of Things in industrial and business settings. Three parallel tracks run across three rooms throughout the day, with both local Bulgarian practitioners and international speakers. It sits within the developer and AI research circuit tracked by Events Index. Tickets are handled via Eventbrite, and the call for speakers ran on Sessionize until it closed with 57 submissions.
AI Industrial Summit operates as a community conference at the intersection of applied AI and industrial technology. It is small by the standards of the major European AI events, but it occupies a specific role in Bulgaria's tech community as one of the few recurring practitioner-focused events on industrial AI. The Sofia Tech Park venue, Bulgaria's primary science and technology park, provides a fitting context for discussions about applied technology in industry. The 2026 name "AI Next" signals a deliberate tilt toward current AI topics, and the submitted programme reflects that: AI agents, large language models, edge computing, knowledge graphs, and enterprise AI implementation all appear among the 57 sessions proposed through the open call. For readers comparing options on the developer and AI research circuit, the summit's distinguishing traits are its free or near-free admission, its community governance rather than a commercial promoter, and its concentration on industrial and automation use cases rather than consumer AI.
The 2026 call for speakers closed with 57 submissions on Sessionize. Names appearing in the submitted programme include:
Speaker affiliations are not published alongside the submissions on the Sessionize page, and the final confirmed line-up may differ from the submission list. Check iotsummit.tech for the published schedule closer to the event.
The official site lists supporting organisations for the event. Logos surfaced for the 2025 edition included Microsoft, ICB, Baringa, Xebia, AI Cloud Agency, EPAM, Kinkao, and Sofia Tech Park as the host venue. The 2026 sponsor roster is not fully published as of this verification; whether every 2025 supporter returns is not confirmed. For adjacent events on the same circuit, attendees also track AI in Production 2026, Applied AI Conf, and AgentCon Berlin among the practitioner-focused fixtures listed on the developer and AI research circuit page and in the upcoming EMEA events index.
AI Industrial Summit is a community-run event rather than a commercially promoted conference, and it does not generate the tier of national or international press that large summits attract. No attributable coverage from named news outlets was found in verifiable sources as of this verification. Visibility for the event runs through community and listing channels rather than editorial media:
No journalist accreditation figures or media-request volumes are published for this event, and none are asserted here.
Sofia Tech Park is Bulgaria's first science and technology park, located on Tsarigradsko Shose Blvd (111B), 1784 Sofia. The Laboratory Complex on Floor 2 provides conference facilities within a research-oriented environment. The park is roughly 6 kilometres from Sofia city centre and is reachable by metro and bus. It hosts technology companies, university spin-offs, and research groups, which makes it a natural home for a summit centred on applied industrial technology. For the 2026 edition the three parallel tracks run in three rooms within this complex.
The Bulgarian Software Community is a non-commercial association focused on organising community events and technical training for IT professionals in Bulgaria. It runs AI Industrial Summit and, before the rebrand, the IoT Bulgaria Summit. The summit is presented by Mihail Mateev on behalf of the community. Mateev is a Microsoft Regional Director and a Microsoft MVP for Azure, Data Platform, and IoT, and chairs the Bulgarian Software Community Association. The community uses Sessionize for its open call for speakers and Eventbrite for ticket distribution, both hallmarks of a volunteer-organised, practitioner-led conference rather than a vendor-run trade show.
Across its IoT Bulgaria Summit roots and its current AI Industrial Summit branding, this is one of Bulgaria's most reliable annual markers in the applied AI and IoT practitioner calendar. Its value is not scale but consistency and access: free or near-free admission, an open call for speakers that drew 57 submissions for 2026, and community governance keep it grounded in practitioner concerns rather than vendor messaging, a profile shared by the smaller fixtures on the developer and AI research circuit.
Tickets are available via Eventbrite. For the 2026 edition, the listing shows a complimentary ticket at EUR 0 and a paid early-bird ticket at EUR 18.00. Admission is therefore free at the base tier, with a low-cost supporter option; there is no high-price professional tier of the kind seen at commercial AI summits. Refunds are available up to 7 days before the event, per the Eventbrite listing. Check iotsummit.tech and the Eventbrite page for current availability, as free places at community events of this kind can be capped.
Registration URL: https://www.iotsummit.tech/
They are the same event. "AI Next" is the subtitle used for the 2026 edition of AI Industrial Summit. The summit itself descends from the IoT Bulgaria Summit run in 2016 to 2019, which was extended with AI content and rebranded from 2022 onward.
The submitted programme leans toward current applied AI alongside the event's automation and IoT roots: AI agents, large language models, edge computing, knowledge graphs, and enterprise AI implementation all feature among the 57 sessions proposed through the open call. The framing remains industrial and business-oriented rather than consumer AI.
Not explicitly confirmed in available sources. The programme mixes local Bulgarian and international speakers, so sessions are likely delivered in both Bulgarian and English. Verify on iotsummit.tech before relying on English-only content.
There is a complimentary ticket at EUR 0 on the Eventbrite listing, so free attendance is possible. A paid early-bird ticket at EUR 18.00 is also offered as a supporter option. Registration is required either way.
Sofia Tech Park is on Tsarigradsko Shose Blvd (111B), roughly 6 kilometres from Sofia city centre, and is reachable by metro (Line 1) and bus. The summit is held in the Laboratory Complex, Floor 2.
No. The call for speakers ran on Sessionize and has closed, with 57 submissions received. Submissions are no longer possible for the 2026 edition.
Not publicly disclosed as of verification. The event is described as a one-day in-person conference.
| Official website | https://www.iotsummit.tech/ |
| Register (Eventbrite) | https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ai-industrial-summit-2026-ai-next-tickets-1977151427142 |
| Call for speakers (Sessionize) | https://sessionize.com/ai-industrial-summit-2026/ |
| Developer and AI research circuit (Events Index) | /developer-ai.html |
| Upcoming EMEA events (Events Index) | /upcoming.html |