Talking tech over pints: London Tech Drinks founder relaunches as Gathr – UKTN

The entrepreneur behind London Tech Drinks has relaunched the forum as Gather, a community of almost 10,000 investors, founders, operators and service providers focused on connecting the tech ecosystem.

Mark Shepherd, who began the gathering as an informal meet-up between London tech founders organised via LinkedIn, has now formalised the community to offer deeper networks of support to emerging tech businesses.

Built across three verticals — Gathr to Connect, Gathr to Learn, and Gathr to Find — Gathr offers founders, investors, operators and advisors the chance to connect with peers, learn from experts and find top providers to help them scale, with each part of the business all having one thing in common: the desire to help other people to succeed and address the many hurdles tech companies face on their growth journey.

The most recent offering, Gathr to Find, is a community recommended, B2B marketplace to help users find service and software providers.

Founder and CEO, Mark Shepherd, said: “London Tech Drinks started out in Feb 2022, as a single post on Linkedin asking if anyone wanted to meet up and go for a drink in response to my own mental health challenges and the desire to bring like minded people together.

“From initially expecting 10 people maximum who would want to meet, the response has been overwhelming, with the community organically growing to nearly 10,000 people. As we scale, we have continued to launch more peer groups, to ensure people can meet others at a similar stage, sector and seniority.”

Arabella Reeves, Former Platform Manager at Atomico and Board Member of the Global VC Platform Community, said: “Mark has built an extraordinary community spanning the entire tech landscape at Gathr.

“By aggregating meticulously curated recommendations from highly reputable VCs, founders and operators worldwide, Gathr has created an incredibly valuable and trustworthy platform that will help save time and energy in researching the best in class providers, allowing businesses to instead focus on their growth and execution strategies.”