GLOBAL Sales Tech Festival 2025: From Sales to Global Growth
On March 2, 2025, Barcelona became the beating heart of sales innovation and business expansion as the GLOBAL Sales Tech Festival (#GSTF25) unfolded at The Social Hub (TSH) in the 22@ innovation district. As the MWC Barcelona warm-up event, the festival kicked off with an opening session led by Mario Paladini, Co-Founder & CEO of Club GLOBALS, and Maria Guirado, Regional Commercial Manager Iberia at The Social Hub, setting the stage for an action-packed day of learning, networking, and collaboration.
With two dynamic stages and multiple hands-on workshops, GSTF25 featured over 30 sessions, bringing together top tech entrepreneurs, investors, and corporate leaders to tackle one of Europe’s biggest business challenges—turning great technology into scalable, global success.
The Story behind the GLOBAL Sales Tech Festival
The GLOBAL Sales Tech Festival was born out of a critical gap in the European startup ecosystem—we build great technology, but struggle to sell it at the level of our American counterparts. While Europe excels in innovation and deep tech, the ability to commercialize and scale those innovations often lags behind.
At Club GLOBALS, we recognized that sales is a main pain point for startups. Founders, particularly in tech, frequently encounter challenges in crafting scalable sales processes, mastering founder-led sales, and structuring teams for sustainable revenue growth. Without strong sales strategies, even groundbreaking innovations can struggle to survive.
Held as the official warm-up event for MWC/4YFN, GSTF born to bridge the gap between tech innovation and execution, ensuring that founders and business leaders can turn cutting-edge technology into commercial success.
Highlights of GSTF25
✅ Diverse Speaker Lineup: Over 60+ top-tier speakers from tech, sales, and business innovation shared groundbreaking insights.
✅ Engaged Audience: More than 500 participants at The Social Hub (TSH) in Barcelona, actively engaging in networking, panels, and business matchmaking.
✅ Human-Centered Diversity: Without setting quotas, the festival naturally attracted an impressive balance of perspectives, proving that diversity is a driver of success—with over half of the speaker lineup featuring remarkable female leaders shaping the future of tech and sales.
✅ Premiere Book Signings: Attendees had the exclusive opportunity to engage with two visionary authors:
- Zoltan Vardy, unveiling insights from The Launch Code – Master Founder-Led Sales and Boost Your Business. (Read the full interview here)
- José Luis Cordeiro, presenting his bestselling book The Death of Death, exploring scientific advancements toward longevity.
✅ Networking at Its Best: Jessica Breitenfeld, known for her expertise in connecting high-impact professionals, led exclusive networking sessions, ensuring that every attendee left with valuable contacts and business opportunities.
Key Sessions of GSTF25
✅ Panel: Empowerment Networks – How Communities Ignite Growth
This session explored how strong communities fuel innovation, collaboration, and business growth. The panelists: Mario Paladini (Club GLOBALS), Brian Pallas (Opportunity Network), Isabel Sabadi (22@ Network BCN), Maria Guirado (The Social Hub), and Enrique Schonberg (ASAEDE) shared real-world insights on how to build and leverage networks that inspire action and drive tangible results.
✅ How to Build a B2B Sales Machine
Prospects have changed. Technology has changed. Now, it’s time to reinvent sales processes to match today’s fast-paced, tech-driven business landscape. On this session Jorik Van den Bosch (School of Sales), focused on how to build a B2B sales machine that develops prospects automatically, leveraging automation, AI, and modern outreach strategies to generate high-quality leads and drive conversions at scale.
✅ Legal Foundations for Business Expansion
In the fast-paced world of business, understanding the legal landscape is crucial for sustainable growth and success. José María Baños (Managing Partner & Founder, Letslaw), provided entrepreneurs, business owners, and professionals with essential legal knowledge to navigate challenges while pursuing strategic expansion.
✅ MRR Growth – What Investors Crave
Investors are drawn to smart, scalable growth strategies. In this panel, Michael Brehm (Redstone), Taryn Andersen (Impulse4Women), and Astghik Zakharyan (Startup Investor Accelerator) broke down how aligning sales and marketing efforts can increase monthly recurring revenue (MRR) and capture investor interest. Attendees walked away with proven tactics to boost growth, secure funding, and scale with confidence.
You can view the full 2025 agenda here
The Speakers Lunch
At GSTF25, we took networking to the next level with an exclusive Speakers’ Lunch at The Social Hub rooftop with 360 Barcelona views, where thought leaders and industry pioneers gathered for a relaxed yet high-value connection experience. Guests enjoyed a premium wine tasting courtesy of Bodegas López, featuring selections from their La Bodegaza line—an exquisite blend of tradition and innovation in winemaking. Paired perfectly with delicious Argentine empanadas from Reloko, the lunch also included a sweet touch with Bon o Bon chocolates and Mardel’s signature alfajores treats.
The GLOBALS Awards: A First Look at the Future of Recognition
At GSTF25, attendees witnessed the first-ever pilot edition of the GLOBALS Awards, a test-run event designed to explore whether the festival could serve as a launchpad for recognizing breakthrough innovation, international scaling success, and tech-driven business excellence. Unlike a traditional awards ceremony, this pilot event was a live experiment—a way to test the format, engage the audience, and gather feedback to refine what will become a major milestone event in future GSTF editions. This session featured a first round of nominee pitches, where top innovators in growth and global expansion took the stage to share their success stories before an expert jury and live audience. This pilot wasn’t about selecting winners and losers—it was about exploring different ways to celebrate and accelerate global tech expansion.
Meet the Pioneers Taking the Stage
🚀 Jakob Saalfrank – CEO, Grasshopper Air Mobility
🤖 Andrés Pulgarin – CEO & Founder, BotsLovers
📦 Mike Cuingnet – CEO & Co-Founder, Tennders
💡 David Riudor – Co-Founder, AngelAI
📊 Toni Keskinen – Co-Founder & CPO, 180ops
Expert Jury & Live Feedback
🎓 Jan Brinckmann – Professor, ESADE Business School
💰 Michael Brehm – Founding Partner, Redstone
Rather than a formal competition, the jury provided constructive feedback, tested evaluation criteria, and engaged in an open discussion about what defines true global business success. This interactive approach allowed both the nominees and the audience to gain key takeaways on international growth strategies.
While this was just a pilot event, it marked the beginning of a larger initiative—a full-scale GLOBALS Awards that will officially launch at the end of 2025, after a year of refinement through GSTF On Tour.
By testing the format, we have taken a bold first step toward creating an awards program that goes beyond trophies and titles—one that truly supports, celebrates, and accelerates international tech expansion.
The Evolution of GSTF: Redefining Sales Towards International Growth
Since its inception in 2023, Europe’s annual festival for business expansion and international scaling has grown far beyond its original scope. What began as a small event to help startups sell better has naturally evolved into something much bigger—a global platform for growth acceleration.
Sales remains at the core, but as the business landscape transforms, so does GSTF. Today, sales is no longer just about closing deals—it is about branding, positioning, marketing, storytelling, partnerships, and community building. The traditional sales funnel has evolved into a holistic, multi-touchpoint journey, and as AI and automation take over operational tasks, the human side of business—strategy, relationships, and trust-building—becomes even more important.
Recognizing this shift, GSTF is evolving into the GLOBALS Tech Festival (#GSTF26). While sales will always remain a pillar, the focus expands to include broader themes of internationalization, AI-driven business transformation, and digital growth strategies. This evolution reflects not just the changing market but also the needs of our community—tech leaders who are looking beyond local markets and into global scaling opportunities.
Taking GSTF Beyond Barcelona: Connecting Members Across Continents
The upcoming festival, scheduled for March 1, 2026, in Barcelona, will retain its position as the ultimate warm-up event for MWC/4YFN while growing into a platform that fosters international business collaboration and groundbreaking technological advancements.
But we’re not stopping there.
To extend our impact beyond Europe, we are launching a four-year expansion plan with GSTF On Tour. This is not about organizing full-scale festivals in every city, but about embedding our community into key tech conferences across different continents, creating exclusive networking experiences that open dialogue and build community in each market.
Each year, we will travel to seven key tech hubs across different regions, leveraging existing major conferences as platforms to connect our members, engage in market entry conversations, and build cross-border business relationships:
📍 2025 (GSTF26 Tour): 7 cities in Europe
📍 2026 (GSTF27 Tour): 7 cities in the Americas (North America & LATAM)
📍 2027 (GSTF28 Tour): 7 cities in Asia & the Middle East
📍 2028 (GSTF29 Tour): 7 cities in Africa
By aligning with major tech conferences, GSTF On Tour will offer curated networking events, strategic connections, and intimate gatherings designed to help our community expand into these new markets. Rather than creating standalone festivals, we will integrate into the existing ecosystem, building bridges between our members and the global tech landscape.
Join us and fast-track your global expansion, see you on tour! 🚀
Huge thanks to the organizations who made this edition possible
Why Join Club GLOBALS?
Did you know? As a Club GLOBALS member, you automatically gain access to the GLOBALS Tech Festival (GSTF) and can even apply for an exhibitor booth? Or join GSTF On Tour networking experiences at top tech events across different continents? The journey kicks off in Malta on May 10, 2025, leading up to GSTF26 in Barcelona on March 1, 2026.
But GSTF is just the beginning. Membership in Club GLOBALS is more than access to a series of events—it’s about being part of a GLOBAL Vision that connects you to high-impact opportunities across multiple markets.
Apply today and make the right connections at the right time.
