A summit that had to travel

The Google.org Impact Summit had already found its shape, a high-end, retreat-style leadership summit bringing C-suite leaders from the nonprofit and philanthropy sector together to think, connect and leave better equipped to use AI for social good. London had set the standard, APAC was a new chapter, and it asked more of us.

The brief was to take a proven format into a new regional context, embed AI into every part of the experience, and practically equip nonprofit leaders with tools they could take back to their organisations. Operating in India brought its own complexity, venue negotiations, local sourcing, different cost structures and none of that could show in the room.

We let the audience profile shape the programme before anything else. Around 60% of attendees came from nonprofit backgrounds, most in founder or C-suite roles, people with high expectations and limited patience for experiences that look good but don't go anywhere useful. Pre-event polls helped us understand what mattered to them before they arrived. From this, we built sessions such as the ‘Practical Gemini Tools Training’ which became the most praised session of the summit. Attendees asked for more of it, that's the signal that counts.

The two-day programme moved deliberately between plenary talks, fireside chats, breakout sessions, speed networking and forums, giving people time to absorb and the space to actually connect. AI ran throughout including live session transcripts on screens, Gemini-powered summaries downloadable via the app, matchmaking and communications through Canapii. 950 in-app chats and 99 AI summary downloads suggested people were genuinely using what was on offer.

Creatively, the backlit 'Pathway to Potential' corridor became one of the most photographed moments of the event. Subtle cultural references were woven into the set design and wayfinding. Despite initial constraints regarding customisation, the venue was successfully transformed to feel entirely Google.org. Where challenges arose (equipment workarounds, a tight timeline for the demo builds) the team adapted without it showing.

One attendee described the event as ‘bringing together diverse perspectives in a way that was genuinely inspiring.’ Another singled out the event design, the lightning talk format, the networking spaces, the quality of the people in the room.

Bringing the Impact Summit to APAC for the first time meant holding the standard of everything that came before, in a new context that asked more of us. What made it work was letting insight lead, designing around how people actually connect and learn, and treating every detail as part of the same story.