Alexander Teuma Shuts Down SaaStock and Relaunches Europe's Biggest SaaS Conference as Shift AI

Alexander Teuma is closing the SaaStock brand after ten years and moving Europe's largest B2B SaaS conference to a new format called Shift AI. The last SaaStock has already taken place in Austin on 15–16 April 2026, and the first Shift Europe is set for 13–14 October 2026 in Barcelona.

The end of the SaaStock era

For the European B2B market, this is more than a change of signage. SaaStock was long one of the main meeting points for founders, investors and operating teams at SaaS companies, and the brand became almost synonymous with the industry conference. The decision to retire it means that even a strong, recognizable name no longer delivers the same effect when the broader market narrative around it weakens. For many attendees it was a fixed point in the calendar, not just another event on the list.

It is symbolic that the final stop was not in Europe but in Austin, where the last event under the old name took place on 15–16 April. The project is not shutting down entirely, though. It is being relaunched under a new frame: instead of talking only about SaaS, the organizers want to talk about what now draws the most attention from audiences, partners and money: AI. In essence, this is not a cosmetic rebrand but an attempt to redefine what actually brings the market together on one stage today.

Why the course is changing

Teuma himself explained the pivot bluntly: in the first quarter of 2026, about $2 trillion disappeared from the market capitalization of SaaS companies. Against that backdrop, a conference built entirely around SaaS inevitably runs into what the whole sector is facing: cautious investors, rebuilt budgets and fading interest in the old growth stories. For event organizers this means a simple choice: defend the old agenda or move to where demand is now forming. In these conditions, the old brand becomes an asset and a constraint at the same time.

The move from SaaStock to Shift AI shows how quickly the center of gravity in the tech market is shifting:

• instead of classic SaaS growth, AI products and automation will dominate the stage
• the focus will move from the subscription model to deploying models, agents and infrastructure
• the audience will widen: AI teams, platforms and service companies will join SaaS founders
• sponsorship money and media attention will flow to where the market expects the next growth

This matters beyond the conference business. When an organizer of this weight drops the word SaaS from its name, it records a shift in the industry's vocabulary. Not long ago, SaaS was the umbrella term for most B2B startups. Now AI is becoming that word, even if many new products will still be subscription services in terms of business model. It is not only the capital market that is changing, but also how companies explain themselves to investors, customers and future employees.

What comes next

The new chapter begins in Barcelona: the first Shift Europe is scheduled for 13–14 October 2026. Among the details available so far, the main point is clear: this is not a side track inside the old conference but a full replacement of the brand. That gives organizers a chance to rebuild the program from scratch, repackage partner offerings and go to market with a more relevant promise than yet another discussion of scaling SaaS.

The rebrand also changes attendees' expectations. If the program's core used to be built almost automatically around sales, retention, pricing and the operational efficiency of SaaS companies, the emphasis will now likely shift to AI products, the use of models in business and the practice of commercializing new tools. Put simply, the conference is trying to plug into the hottest part of the tech market rather than a mature category. That is especially important for startups looking for new partners and capital.

What this means

The SaaStock story shows how fast AI is displacing SaaS as the main language of the tech industry. If even Europe's largest dedicated conference changes its identity, it is a signal to founders, investors and vendors: attention, budgets and networking are now concentrating around the AI agenda. That is where new deals will be made and a new agenda will take shape in the coming years.