The five-day festival taking place in Greater Manchester will unite the digital sector in one place, with unique opportunities for networking, collaboration and socialising with senior and influential figures across the whole week.

And on March 9th and 10th, the sector will congregate at Manchester Central for Digital City Expo, where leading businesses across marketing, tech, ecommerce and more will be exhibiting and making new connections.

In the very same place, a wide range of influential figures will take to the stage to share their expert insights with attendees. Registration for the expo, which provides access to all of this and more, is open now.

Digital City Festival is sure to be an unmissable event for digital professionals at all levels. Let’s take a look at the speakers and events announced so far for this year’s event, with many more still to be revealed.

Industry leaders speaking at Digital City Expo 2022

Across its eight stages - the Keynote Theatre, Tech Masterclass Theatre, Marketing Masterclass Theatre, eCommerce Masterclass Theatre, Media Masterclass Theatre, Tech Sector Specialist Theatre, Marketing Sector Specialist Theatre and eCommerce Sector Specialist Theatre - Digital City Expo is set to put on a full programme of speakers to address the thousands of attendees set to join the event in March.

They include Gareth Turner of Weetabix, Phil Benson of UKBlackTech, and Dominique Elsey of Hootsuite - whose talk was so popular in 2020 it was standing room only!

Announced so far are:

• Dominique Elsey, Industry Marketing Strategist at Hootsuite

• Dave Beech, Staff Solutions Architect at Aiven

• Phil Benson, Co-founder of UKBlackTech

• Ralph Varcoe, Chief Growth Officer and MD IoT at Connexin

• Agnes Lind, Solution Engineer at Acquia

• Rosa Mitchell, Head of Digital PR at Connective3

• Deri Jones, CEO and Founder of thinkTRIBE

• Gareth Turner, Head of Marketing at Weetabix

• Councillor Bev Craig, Leader of Manchester City Council and GMCA Lead for Digital, Education, Skills, Work and Apprenticeships 

• Victoria Knight, Strategic Campaigns Director at BAE Systems and Co-Chair of Greater Manchester Cyber Security Advisory Group

• Detective Superintendent Neil Jones, Managing Director at North West Cyber Resilience Centre

• Ruby Motabhoy, Innovation Lead at Plexal

• Adam Hindle, Managing Director of Fluid Commerce

Partner events taking place across the city

In 2020, a range of more than 50 partner events took place all across Greater Manchester engaging the whole of the digital sector in venues city-wide. These included Tech Nation’s celebration of a thriving tech sector in the North and events from Dept, AND Digital and Boss Women.

This year the selection is set to be even more entertaining, engaging and educational - with specialisms like cyber security, social media, esports and more encompassed.

You can still pitch your event as part of the wider Digital City Festival. Click here to suggest a partner event of your own.

Revealed so far:

• The National Cyber Summit is taking place at HOST Social on March 7th at 10:30am.

• SocialNorth will be at the Stoller Hall in the city centre at 6:30pm on March 7th.

• ‘Collaborating to get GM residents online’ hosted by GM Digital - Greater Manchester Combined Authority on March 8th at 9am.

• ‘Building Greater Manchester’s future digital workforce’ will be hosted at the Prince’s Trust at 12:30pm on March 8th.

• PureClarity will host the virtual ‘How to improve your customer experience to win more sales online’ on March 8th at 2pm.

• To mark International Women’s Day on March 8th, Brighter Sound hosts a celebration of its Both Sides Now gender equality programme and launches the Both Sides Now Manifesto for Change at Depot Mayfield at 7pm.

• On March 11th, #AmafestUK - a full-day conference for Amazon sellers - is hosted by Online Seller UK at Huckletree Ancoats starting at 9am.

• The inaugural Esports Festival is organised by HOST Salford, taking place all-day on March 11th at their very own HOST Social, featuring the ESI breakfast club, a series of roundtables, panel discussions and networking events.

See everything that’s coming up at the What’s On page.

All this and more will be on-top of the two-day Digital City Expo at Manchester Central, the Leaders’ Reception, and the Digital City Awards at the Etihad Stadium in Manchester. With more and more attendees and supporters signing up as we speak, more announcements about speakers and partner events are coming very soon.

To make the most of everything that’s going on in Manchester throughout Digital City Festival week, make sure to register your place here.