Shape
  • About
  • Program
  • Presenters
  • Partners
Become a Partner

Pubtech2025

Smarter Workflows, Safer Platforms, Stronger Connections

WELCOME TO THE 3RD ANNUAL PUBTECH VIRTUAL EVENT!

Learn how digital publishers grow and engage their audiences using smart tech solutions and strategies.

  • 17-18 November 2025

  • 4 PM & 5 PM CET 
    10 AM & 11 AM ET

  • Online Event

5 panelists

Listen to the presentations by tech and publishing experts, ask questions, and apply the learnings to your digital property.

100+ attendees

Interact with digital publishing professionals from around the world, share experiences, and discover collaboration opportunities.

2 days of learning

The event features sessions in a variety of formats: presentations, workshops, and more.

About the event

A new phase from AI experimentation to becoming embedded parts of a news or media publisher is shifting the landscape. Open standard protocols are bringing a renowned sense of interoperability of data for complex tasks, providing new opportunities to improve efficiencies and personalization with larger rewards. Yet questions remain about ethics, oversight, and productivity. At the same time, misinformation, deepfakes, and unsafe ad placements have pushed brand safety from a background concern to a boardroom priority. Meanwhile, audience discovery is being rewritten: search engines are rolling out generative answers, agentic search is on the rise, and zero-click and environments are making it harder than ever to control how content is surfaced. 

 

Publishers need more new tools than ever that balances innovation responsibly.

  • Smarter Workflows powered by AI and automation to cut overhead and free teams for creativity.

  • Safer Platforms that protect brands, data, and user trust in an era of synthetic content and tightening regulation.

  • Stronger Connections with audiences who demand relevance, transparency, and meaningful engagement across channels.

 

Grab your pass

Over two days, senior product, engineering, and technology leaders, alongside industry innovators and technologists, will gather both online and in person for targeted sessions, practical workshops, and candid discussions on what’s next for publishing. Centered around the key themes Smarter Workflows, Safer Platforms, and Stronger Connections, the event will explore how to build resilient, future-ready publishing systems, offering strategic insights and actionable takeaways to strengthen operational efficiency, enhance platform integrity, and foster collaboration across the publishing ecosystem; setting the stage for success in 2026 and beyond.

This event is ideally suited for

  • Founders/CEOs

  • Chief Technology Officer

  • Director of Engineering

  • Senior Product Leaders

  • Adtech/Ad Revenue Leaders

Who attended PubTech2024

Inquirer
Indian Express
ABC
Momentum media
Mamamia
LAOLA1
The conversation
Informa
SPH Media
New York Post
Drive.com.au

The program

ALL TIMES ARE IN CENTRAL EUROPEAN TIME

The program features: presentations, Q&A, fireside conversation and case study. You can register for a single session or for the entire event.

17 Nov 20254:00 pm
17 Nov 20254:00 pm

Next-Gen PubTech: What Publishers Need to Know for 2026

Presentation + Q&A

Get ahead of the technologies set to transform publishing in 2026. From AI agents and agentic search to modular content platforms, synthetic media, and personalization systems, this session unpacks the PubTech trends every publisher should be watching.

Anabelle Nicoud
AI News & Editorial Strategy
IBM

17 Nov 20255:00 pm
17 Nov 20255:00 pm

Designing the Future Publishing Stack

Fireside Conversation + Case Study

Join Eric Ulken (Stanford University) for a session on how publishers can design future-ready tech stacks that enable smarter workflows, responsible AI use, and sustainable audience growth. Drawing on his experience as Vice President, Product and AI Steering Committee Co-chair at The Baltimore Banner, Eric will share practical lessons on evaluating when to build versus buy, fostering AI innovation responsibly, strengthening audience relationships through web, email, and app strategies, and maintaining adaptability as new discovery and distribution platforms emerge. Attendees will gain actionable insights and recommendations to guide technology and AI adoption decisions that build smarter, safer, and stronger publishing operations heading into 2025–26.

Eric Ulken
John S. Knight Journalism Fellow
Standford University

17 Nov 20256:30 pm
17 Nov 20256:30 pm

PubTech Dinner Event London 2025 (Offline)

PubTech Dinner

This PubTech Dinner explores how smarter workflows, safer platforms, and stronger connections can be achieved through the intersection of product, design, and AI innovation. Guest speaker Mel McVeigh will share insights from her experience at Condé Nast and advising global media organisations, focusing on how uniting product and design disciplines can lead to scalable transformation roadmaps for publishers.

Reserve your seat
18 Nov 20254:00 pm
18 Nov 20254:00 pm

Privacy, Identity & Intelligent Frameworks — Trust as a Platform Advantage

Panel Discussion

With third-party cookies use diminished, the foundation of digital monetization is being rebuilt around authentication, first-party identity, and intelligent data frameworks. From access protocols that verify who engages with publisher content to agentic systems that act on first-party signals, a new ecosystem of trust is taking shape.
In this discussion, industry leaders explore how publishers can combine privacy, authentication, and predictive intelligence to turn trust into a platform advantage — protecting audience data while unlocking smarter personalization, higher CPMs, and sustainable monetization models.
 
Key Themes:
  • How authentication and identity frameworks are reshaping audience monetization
  • Turning privacy and trust into revenue advantages for publishers
  • The role of predictive and agentic intelligence in scaling direct buying

Chao Liao
VP, Strategy & Operations

Permutive

Justin Wohl
Vice President of Strategy
Aditude

Presenters

Anabelle Nicoud

Anabelle Nicoud

AI News & Editorial Strategy
IBM

Linkedin
Read more
Anabelle Nicoud
Anabelle Nicoud works on IBM’s editorial team and writes IBM’s industry newsletter on AI. Based in Silicon Valley for the past four years, Anabelle is at the heart of the ecosystem shaping the future of AI. She also collaborates with WAN-IFRA on AI and media issues, notably through articles and the organisation and programming of Study Tours in Silicon Valley. Before joining IBM, she worked at Apple News, where she contributed to curation strategy and the launch of new features for the app in Canada. She held leadership roles some of Canada’s leading newsrooms of La Presse and Le Devoir and led several award-winning projects and digital transformation projects. She began her career as a journalist. Her reporting has been published in France, Canada, and the United States.
Eric Ulken

Eric Ulken

John S. Knight Journalism Fellow
Standford University

Linkedin
Read more
Eric Ulken
Eric Ulken is the former Vice President, Product and AI Steering Committee Co-chair at The Baltimore Banner. He is a John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Standford University. He has extensive experience in designing future-ready tech stacks, fostering responsible AI innovation, and strengthening audience relationships across web, email, and app platforms.
Chao Liao
Permutive

Chao Liao

Commercial Strategy Lead
Permutive

Linkedin
Read more
Chao Liao
Chao Liao is the Commercial Strategy Lead at Permutive, where he drives growth and revenue innovation by aligning technology, product, and partnerships. With extensive experience across sales strategy, enterprise data architecture, product development, and revenue operations, Chao specializes in transforming market insights into scalable commercial outcomes. His expertise spans adtech, martech, SaaS, media, and data management, with a strong focus on building privacy-first, performance-driven strategies that accelerate P&L growth.
Justin Wohl

Justin Wohl

Vice President of Strategy
Aditude

Linkedin
Read more
Justin Wohl
Justin Wohl is the Vice President of Strategy at Aditude, where he leads initiatives that strengthen the sustainability of independent journalism and the open internet through innovation in publishing technology and programmatic advertising. With a proven track record across the digital media landscape, Justin has successfully guided companies through M&A transitions and profitability turnarounds. His expertise spans product development, monetization, analytics, and strategic partnerships, integrating operational excellence with forward-thinking programmatic strategies to drive meaningful growth for publishers.
Vahe
SODP

Vahe Arabian

Founder
State of Digital Publishing

Linkedin
Read more
Vahe Arabian
With over 15 years of experience in digital media publishing and SEO, Vahe founded State of Digital Publishing, an online publication and platform that covers trends, perspectives, and tech reviews for online publishing and media professionals. His mission is to help publishers grow their digital media properties using SEO and content strategy and to create a community that fosters knowledge sharing and industry collaboration.

Partners

Multidots

Multidots is an Inc. 5000 company and a top global WordPress development agency that specializes in creating large-scale, high-performance, and secure web platforms for enterprise clients. They are a preferred enterprise WordPress implementation partner and a WordPress VIP Gold Partner.

Developer of an online advertising operations technology platform intended to deliver in-stream and out-stream video ads and content management system updates. The company’s platform provides lightning-fast prebid wrappers, turnkey front-end website layouts, and all-in-one video players, enabling publishers to boost their ad revenue and improve page load speeds.

Permutive is a privacy-focused data platform for publishers and advertisers that enables targeted advertising without using third-party cookies. It uses a patented “Edge” technology that processes data directly on users’ devices to build audience segments based on on-site behavior and interests. This allows for data-driven decisions while protecting user privacy through on-device, in-the-moment processing.

Would you like to use this opportunity to promote your brand to a targeted audience of digital publishers? Inquire about sponsorship and media partnership opportunities.

Facebook X-twitter Slack Linkedin

STATE OF DIGITAL PUBLISHING – COPYRIGHT 2025