The Next 20 Years Project

The Next 20 Years Project originally launched in 1998 , connected industry leaders through a series of private events. Originally presented in London, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Austin and San Francisco, visionaries, press, policy makers, VCs, analysts, local entrepreneur’s and start-ups came together in a long-range exploration of what lies ahead. Connecting interesting with the interested, has always been ground zero for us.

The project, affectionately known as TNTY, was originally born from a series of SF industry salons called Last Saturdays held the last Saturday of every month in the private SF home of Bob Ayres. These smaller gatherings through generous support of executives at Ziff Davis publishing (most notably Terri Holbrooke and Dan Farber)  morphed into a larger ongoing lecture and showcase series which traveled to 7 US cities and London. TNTY was, at its heart an industry insider’s preview of the future, covering technology, science and medicine. 

The live gatherings have featured more than 500 sponsoring companies, presented famed futurists Paul Saffo and Michio Kaku, VC’s Ann Winblad and Bill Gurley among others, with top line  journalists from around the world- all speaking on what they saw coming in the next 20 years. The videos (predictions from those shows) will be released online soon. 

The TNTY live lecture series took a sabbatical while our executive producer Bob Ayres contributed on the prestigious Board of Advisors for the TED Conference and became in 2006-2008 the inaugural Executive Director of THE TED PRIZE. TED Prize winners include, among others Bono and Bill Clinton.

In 2011 Bob became the Executive Producer / Licensee for TEDxMarin  Coupling the years working in and around the TED conference including his smaller industry Salons called  TwoDegrees, The Next 20 years project still lives, to relaunch a series of lectures and showcases about what might be coming.

Rumor has it – it will come back

We encourage you to keep in touch with all activities by requesting an invitation to TEDxMarin here.