In a Kitesurfer’s Dream: The First Edition of Kite Tech

With the idea of combining sports, technology and entrepreneurial spirit, the Kite Tech concept was born—becoming a reality only a short time later for their first event in stunning Dakhla.

Brought together through a shared love of kitesurf, the creators of Kite Tech are a diverse and creative bunch: Morgane Ridoret, Dreamkite; Xavier Duportet; Arnaud de la Tour, Hello Tomorrow; Christophe Tallec, We Design Services; Hugo Compas; and Alexandre Mulliez. This star-studded tech startup event took place in a part of the world I never thought I’d have the chance to visit, let alone participate so closely in—even getting the chance to learn how to kitesurf in Dakhla's austere yet vibrant setting.

Here is everything you need to know about the first edition of Kite Tech—the firsthand account from a first time kitesurfer.

Dakhla

The Southern coast of the disputed Western Sahara territory is a sun-baked martian landscape that suddenly crashes into the untamed Atlantic Ocean. Dakhla’s strategic setting is on a peninsula on one of the most Westerly points of the African continent, making it a natural choice as a stopover location for Allied planes during WW2 on the Dakar-Casablanca route. Today, thanks to the infrastructure, this incredibly remote part of the world can easily welcome kite surfers, and other water-gliding seekers, from all over the world (Royal Air Morocco, the only airline to fly there, takes 2 hours from Casablanca).

The lagoon is a kite surfer’s ideal playground; a smooth, near-waveless, high-wind spot with water depth varying from just a few cm to a couple meters—which is perfect for total beginners, professionals, and everyone in-between.

Surrounded by sand dunes, it is also dotted by half a dozen surf centers which have popped up in the past few years—testimony to the rising popularity of the location. The barrier to entry in renewable energy sources (solar and wind are perfect here) have been lowered recently and  have allowed for development in the rigid and remote environment.

As we would find out later in the trip, basic medical facilities are on hand…
Dakhla has a clinic and hospital for more serious situations, but I highly recommend just not getting hurt and avoiding them altogether.

More and this and other stories on Dakhla and kite surfing in a more in-depth article soon. On to the show.

The main event

Everyone was excited to do some kite surfing as soon as possible. Beginners, such as myself, eager to squeeze into wetsuits and get started, while the more experienced in the group looked over their gear, inspected kites and sharpened their boards.

However, this event is also about technology, startups, and entrepreneurs debating and sharing experiences, exchanging advice and creating a bond beyond what you can possibly hope for at a normal networking conference. Almost a week spent with a perfectly sized, brilliant and like-minded group of 40 entrepreneurs, in a remote location, ensures that the goals of the event were met. Kite Tech nailed it—which is incredibly impressive for a first time event.

Approximately 1/3rd of the time was dedicated to the talks and workshops, and the rest to kitesurfing and socializing, which is where the real magic happened. The authentic bonds between people were made during the friendly (and delicious) lunches and dinners, when everyone was networking and discussing about their business challenges and experiences.

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On the stage: the speakers and my highlights from their wisdom

Philippe Ancelin, Rémi Quique and Harold QuinquisThese three bastions of kitesurf gave us a rundown on the the history of it, which immediately set the mood and immersed everyone into the sport whether you had never touched a kite before or practically slept in one (which is rather comfortable by the way).

Maxime Lainé, CEO, and Arthur Berteloot, CCO
They created a B2B geolocalization platform in 2015 which provides geomarketing services to brands and services, allowing them to send notifications and promotions to customers according to their location. Using this technology as their foundation, they created an app called WeeSurf which specifically filtered local current and forecast weather conditions. Throughout the week in Dakhla we successfully used it to find the optimal times for best wind and could plan to either kite surf or have talks. Download it now from the Appstore, it's free.

Alex Mulliez
The CMO of giant AuchanDirect.fr, Alex had an eye-opening talk starting with a slide about “making elephants dance”. He then went on to evangelize his belief that ‘lean management’ and ‘organized chaos’ are currently the best approach for the digital age and his industry, but that it should be applied more extensively everywhere. Acting as a ‘worm in the apple’, he started at his grandfather’s company, Auchan, and shook up an entire division in record time. The result: in nearly no time he has made AuchanDirect relevant in the age of the Amazon behemoth.

The Outdoor Journal
We were up! We had the chance to speak about who we are, what we do, and discuss the exponential growth of the global outdoors market, which has grown from a $65B market to more than $500B in less than 7 years. North America, the UK, Germany, and France, making up about two-thirds of the total spending, consumers want more experiences and less things. This brings more people wanting to travel and wanting to do so responsibly. Kite Surf is a perfect balance of this trend where people not only want to work and network, but come away with new experiences and friendships.
Physical activity has always been a necessary part of a healthy mind; mens sana in corpore sano, as the saying goes. We were also able to speak about our imminent launch of The Outdoor Voyage platform which aims to be a marketplace of the best, safest, and most environmentally responsible adventure experiences, gathering the best operators in the world, in all outdoor activity categories.

Matière Grise
Founder of this tech and start-up recruitment agency, Guillaume Lacoste, had a few pieces of advice. A good CTO makes all the difference but it takes a long time to find the right one—according to him, on average, around 6 months. While there are many different ways to find a good match, such as Linkedin, Angel List, personal networking, specialized forums, etc., the amount of time you’ll spend on this—not knowing you’ll find the right person amongst all that noise, you’re better off going with a specialized agency. Agency fees don’t come cheap, but then again, time is money.

Audrey Franc
A dispassionate plea to everyone  how banks can be a partner for your startup and not just VCs, etc. Albeit their very strict rules, a personal relationship with your banker can open an easier path to getting capital to start your venture. Two main advantages: interest rates have never been lower (it’s basically free money), and investments from a bank avoids you losing control of your company from dilution.

EuroSIMA
Executive director, Franck Laporte, gave a fascinating
overview of a generally little-known association that directly led to the success of what is today a €1.6B industry—in Europe alone. The Surf Industry Manufacturers Association (SIMA) started in the USA and in 1999, after searching for the perfect location in Europe—based on where the best waves were, of course, chose the South-Atlantic coast of France to set up shop. EuroSIMA now includes all board-based sports (snowboarding, etc), and have branched out with Outdoor Sports Valley (OSV) which is gathering even more members to its cluster. The purpose of EuroSIMA is to federate, promote, educate, and develop the sports industry through events, media creation, development projects, sponsorships, award and much more.

One of the direct results of EuroSIMA and the ecosystem that flourished from it is the first startup accelerator focused on water-based extreme sports, Blue Builder. According to Guillaume Cerquant they have the experience and connections to get startups (such as S-Wings) into the door of big industrial groups that are present not only in that area, but throughout Europe.

Ride & Dream
A perfect combination of four complimentary people; Raphaëlle Douté and her vast experience in the travel industry, Renaud Lerooy with his management experience, Cyrill Merlin pro photographer and sports instructor, and last but not least, Julien Leleu, freestyle kite surf champion as well as photographer. They spoke about their experiences with their sports event agency, which despite being very new, has been doing well for itself. Aiming mostly at team building and large events, they create unique experiences that combine amazing destinations and even world champion athletes to participate hands on with teaching kitesurfing to all levels.

UCPA
An all-inclusive sports travel agency giant, UCPA talked their struggles to stay relevant and competitive in today’s frenetic online travel world. The main changes they’re looking to implement would be their target audience and the mammoth undertaking of changing their digital presence over the next couple of years.

Riders Match
In terms of sports media, Harold Quinquis CEO & Founder at Riders Match gave us a preview of their upcoming evolution of their “best extreme videos” website with a whole new service to track the best sports athletes in the world.

PIQ - piq.com sports activity tracker that records thousands of data points in realtime, such as the height of jumps and tricks—even your golf swing or boxing punch. You can play them back later, evaluate your performance and learn from them—or you can just show off your awesome jump height on social media.

One Launch
Magnificent instructions from Philippe Ancelin if you ever want to learn kiting before you hit the beaches.

Woodyboard
Last but not least, Nicolas Guindé brought a couple of his absolutely beautiful handmade kite surf boards. Quite the treat for the kiters to ride on such pieces of craftsmanship and art. Check out his beautiful boards on their site.

More of Lorenzo's Kite Tech photos, stories, and an exclusive interview with champion kite surfer Julien Leleu coming soon!

All images taken by Lorenzo Fornari / The Outdoor Journal