MIT Portugal Innovation Workshop Reunion 2026

About

MIT Portugal Program is excited to announce the Innovation Workshop Reunion on January 16, 2026. This event is for those who participated in 2025 or in previous years in the MIT Portugal International Innovation Workshop (IWI), at MIT campus. The event will take place at FLAD – Fundação Luso-Americana para o Desenvolvimento, in Lisbon.

We hope participants from all IWI cohorts will join us to reconnect, share your progress and achievements, and meet with the like-minded people from yours and other IWI cohorts.

More information about the event’s agenda and speakers will be posted soon.

Please contact mitportugal@mit.edu if you have any questions.

Program

15:00

Registration & Welcome Coffee

15:30

Opening remarks by Michael Baum, FLAD, and Christina Chase, MIT

15:35 – 15:55

Keynote: Ricardo Mendes, Tekever

16:05 – 16:30

Professional speed dating

16:35 – 16:50

IW Alumni panel session with Christina. Panel participants Riddhi Varma (2025), Nelson da Silva Brito (2017), Leandro Madureira (2025)

16:55

Closing word by Doug Hart

17:00 – 19:00

Buffet reception

Speakers

Ricardo Mendes

Co-founder and CEO of the TEKEVER Group

Portugal

Ricardo Mendes

Co-founder and CEO of the TEKEVER Group

Portugal

Bio

Ricardo Mendes is co-founder and CEO of the TEKEVER Group. He underwent graduate, MSc and PhD studies in Software and Computer Engineering at Instituto Superior Técnico (in Lisbon, Portugal), where he specialized in the areas of Artificial Intelligence and Information Systems. Mr. Mendes was a co-founder of TEKEVER in 2001 and led strategy, product and business development as COO until 2018, and as a CEO since then.

Tekever has become a unicorn company in 2025 – that means it’s a privately held startup valued at over $1 billion, a rare benchmark coined by venture capitalist.

Learn more about Tekever in the interview “Unicorns: Tekever, the Portuguese drones taking over the world”