Betting Big Against The Tide (invite-only dinner for exited founders and FO)
In 2009, King Digital Entertainment was haemorrhaging money trying to monetize social games on Facebook and the web. While competitors doubled down on the proven model, Riccardo Zacconi made a decision that seemed borderline reckless: he split his company in half and bet everything on an unproven platform called the iPhone, pivoting to simple puzzle games that industry experts dismissed as "too casual."
That contrarian leap of faith didn't just save King—it created Candy Crush Saga, generated over $7 billion in revenue, and redefined mobile gaming forever.
Riccardo's story goes beyond a lucky pivot. It can teach us about the mindset that needs to find opportunity where others see obstacles. Betting on nascent paradigms while the market clings to yesterday's winners like we chose to do at Silicon Roundabout by always searching for novel technology paradigms, rather than following what most investors pile money into (whether the mainstream is SaaS or AI apps).
Tonight is also about challenging the view that Europe and Europeans are second class entrepreneurs to US ones, and the inspiration for us all as Italian investors to do more and be bolder in creating opportunities that challenge the mainstream venture capital trends for Italians, Europeans, and the world at large.
Exited entrepreneurs and family offices gathering for the Italian Tech Week will join us for an intimate dinner of extremely high calibre investors and wildly successful entrepreneurs like Riccardo to discuss about what the next frontier of technology are today. Especially as the mainstream hype about the current AI paradigms may come crashing down.
What are the assumptions we need to challenge?
What are the bold bets we should take?
What are the new frontiers we can cross in technology?
This is an invite only event for exited founders and family offices, but if this fits your profile you are welcome to apply to join.
Because in a world where consensus thinking delivers consensus returns, the real alpha comes from betting big against the tide.