Thousands of startups applied. Just 200 made Startup Battlefield. Only 20 will pitch on the Disrupt Stage across all three days. Competition goes from October 13-15 at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026. It all comes down to one final decision.

For our Startup Battlefield finalist judges, we set a particularly high bar: Each has founded or co-founded the investment firm they now lead. Collectively, they bring decades of experience backing ambitious founders, building and scaling companies, and making the big bets that can define a venture firm. They know what separates a great pitch from a potentially great company — and they’ll be the five people deciding who becomes this year’s Startup Battlefield champion.

And the conversation won’t end with the final pitch. Later that afternoon, all five judges will reunite on the Builders Stage for a live AMA, where the audience can ask them anything — from what stood out in the competition and what they look for in founders to fundraising, company building, and where they’re looking to invest next.

Grab your pass now and save up to $100 and get a second pass at 50% off. Or bring a group of four or more, saving up to 30%.

Meet the five investors who will decide this year’s Startup Battlefield winner

Stacy Brown-Philpot, Founder and Managing Partner, Cherryrock Capital

Stacy Brown-Philpot is the founder and managing partner of Cherryrock Capital, a venture fund focused on Series A and Series B software companies built by Black and Latinx founders. Her portfolio includes Coactive AI, a multimodal AI platform for media and entertainment, and Vitable Health, which provides primary care plans for hourly workers. Brown-Philpot previously served as CEO of TaskRabbit, which was acquired by IKEA, and spent more than a decade in senior roles at Google. She holds an MBA from Stanford University.

Chi-Hua Chien, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Goodwater Capital

Chi-Hua Chien is a co-founder and managing partner of Goodwater Capital, where he invests exclusively in consumer technology — including mobile, fintech, e-commerce, digital health, and consumer AI — across the United States and Asia. With more than 17 unicorns backed across his career, his portfolio includes Spotify, Chime, Monzo, TikTok/Musical.ly, Coupang, Toss, and Udemy. Before co-founding Goodwater, Chien was a general partner at Kleiner Perkins and a principal at Accel.

Dayna Grayson, Co-Founder and General Partner, Construct Capital

Dayna Grayson is a co-founder and general partner at Construct Capital, a Washington, D.C.-based early-stage fund focused on technology for foundational American industries, including manufacturing, logistics, transportation, supply chain, and defense. Her portfolio includes Veho, Hadrian, Copia Automation, Arkestro, and Verve Motion. Before co-founding Construct, Grayson was a partner at NEA, where she led early investments, including Desktop Metal, which went public on the NYSE. She holds a degree in systems engineering from the University of Virginia and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Carter Reum, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, M13

Carter Reum is a co-founder and managing partner of M13, a consumer technology venture firm with $1.9 billion under management that invests in seed to Series B companies shaping the future of work, commerce, health, and money. Across more than 200 investments, M13 has backed companies such as Lyft, Pinterest, Ring, Daily Harvest, and Tonal — with 15 unicorns in the portfolio. Before launching M13, Reum co-founded VEEV Spirit, one of the fastest-growing independent spirits brands in the country, which was acquired in 2016. He is co-author of the national bestseller “Shortcut Your Startup” and holds a BA from Columbia University.

Alexa on Tobel, Founder and Managing Partner, Inspired Capital

Alexa Von Tobel is the founder and managing partner of Inspired Capital, which she co-founded with former U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker. Her portfolio includes MosaicML, acquired by Databricks, as well as Chief, Finix, and Dandy — with nine unicorns backed across her investing career. Before launching Inspired Capital, Von Tobel founded LearnVest, a financial planning platform acquired by Northwestern Mutual. She is a New York Times bestselling author and a certified financial planner.

One week until Startup Battlefield begins — grab your ticket now

Don’t miss the ultimate pitch competition if you’re currently scaling a startup or have an idea you’re ready to launch. Startup Battlefield is a masterclass in how to pitch and scale a viable startup. VC judges will determine what it takes to scale, and you’ll hear firsthand what VCs look for when backing the next big innovation.

You can only witness this competition on the Disrupt Stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, where 10,000+ founders, investors, operators, and tech enthusiasts gather to see what’s next and hear from 250+ tech leaders who’ve made waves across 200+ sessions spanning six industry stages, roundtables, and breakouts. See what’s next at one of the most anticipated tech conferences of the year.

Grab your ticket now, save up to $100, and get a second pass at 50% off before doors open on October 13. Laid off? Get your $75 Expo+ Pass before they’re gone.

A new fleet of AI agents is making its presence felt on the Internet. On Sunday, a group of independent researchers posted preliminary findings about the agents, observing that they seem to be running on Tencent’s infrastructure and targeting Alibaba’s map service, Amap.

Researchers, however, resisted the term “swarm,” noting that there seems to be little coordination between their different queries. “‘Agent fleet,’ not ‘swarm:’” one researcher wrote in the preliminary report, “many parallel agents on the same kind of task, with no sign of communication between them.”

The agents were discovered by monitoring traffic to the domain-scanning service, URLquery, a technique that previously revealed long-running activity by OpenAI agents. AI agents often use URLquery to load websites that they cannot access directly, leaving a record of their activities that can be valuable to researchers.

In this case, the record showed queries to Alibaba’s Amap service, seeking directions to different entrances of various public places, including a park, a zoo, and a hospital.

The research is ongoing and so few details are available, but the behavior shows how persistent AI agent activity has become on the internet. In the wake of the Hugging Face incident, many researchers are actively monitoring for rogue agent activity on the internet. Much of that activity has been easy to find because agents tend to use the same techniques and make little effort to conceal themselves.

In this case, the agents don’t seem to have been doing anything more nefarious than side-stepping Alibaba’s API rules — but we may not always be so lucky.

The biggest stage at TechCrunch Disrupt is where the people building the future come to talk about what happens next in the tech ecosystem.

Across three days, from October 13 to 15, at Moscone West in San Francisco, the Disrupt Stage will bring together some of the biggest game-changing founders, CEOs, and investors shaping everything from AI and robotics to transportation, social media, biotech, and venture capital, alongside the next generation of founders competing live in Startup Battlefield 200.

Don’t miss a single moment of these conversations shaping the future of the tech ecosystem. Get a front-row seat by registering for your pass here. Bring your co-founder, partner, colleague, or peer and save 50% on their second pass. Have more people who should be there? Save even more with bundle passes.

Meet the entire Disrupt Stage lineup

Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe will unpack what it takes to build the seemingly impossible: turning an ambitious idea into a company capable of designing, manufacturing, and scaling complex physical products.

Cerebras CEO Andrew Feldman will tackle one of the biggest questions hanging over the AI boom: Can AI keep scaling? As models demand ever more compute, energy, and capital, Feldman will explore where the current trajectory leads and what could break it.

Science Corporation founder Max Hodak looks beyond screens at a future in which technology increasingly interacts directly with the human body, while Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley joins us for a candid conversation about AI, surveillance, and the future of public safety.

And in a rare appearance, all five partners of Benchmark — Jack Altman, Peter Fenton, Chetan Puttagunta, Everett Randle, and Eric Vishria — will take the stage together, sharing what one of Silicon Valley’s most closely watched venture firms sees coming next.

Ricursive Intelligence co-founders Anna Goldie and Azalia Mirhoseini will take us inside an even more radical possibility: AI systems that can design the hardware they run on, potentially collapsing the traditional divide between software and silicon.

On Thursday, Amazon’s Panos Panay asks what comes after the smartphone. And he’ll bring some new tech with him. Bluesky CEO Toni Schneider and COO Rose Wang will explore whether social media can start over, while Replit CEO Amjad Masad tackles what happens to software, and the people who build it, when AI makes creating software accessible to almost anyone.

Finally, Hollywood star, entrepreneur, and investor Mark Wahlberg takes the Disrupt Stage alongside Keebeck’s Bruce K. Lee to reveal how one of the world’s most recognizable celebrities is turning decades of influence, relationships, and business-building into his next act: becoming a serious investor.

Sit front and center at the Disrupt Stage to hear directly from the leaders shaping tech. Register now and get a second pass at 50% off.

And then there’s Startup Battlefield

Throughout Disrupt, founders will compete live across space and physical AI, energy and manufacturing, health tech and life sciences, and enterprise and security — facing questions from some of the world’s leading investors as they fight for a place in the Startup Battlefield final.

Before this year’s finalists take the stage, Cellino co-founder and CEO Nabiha Saklayen, who won Startup Battlefield in 2021, returns to unveil her new product and ask a provocative question: Can you bank your biology?

Then three more Battlefield alumni — Molecule.one’s Piotr Byrski, Nephrogen’s Demetri Maxim, and Glīd’s Kevin Damoa — return to talk candidly about what happens after the pitch: the bets that paid off, the plans that changed, and what they wish they’d known when they were standing where this year’s finalists are now.

Finally, the 2026 finalists take over the Disrupt Stage, and one company walks away as the next Startup Battlefield winner, taking home $100,000 in equity-free funding and the coveted Disrupt cup.

Grab your pass and hear directly from today’s tech leaders at Disrupt

The Disrupt Stage isn’t only about hearing from the people who built today’s defining companies. It’s where you’ll meet and hear from some of the tech leaders building the next ones.

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 is where 10,000+ founders, VCs, operators, and tech enthusiasts from around the globe come together to gain valuable insights, make impactful connections, and get a first look at next-gen breakthroughs shaping the tech industry. Explore 200+ sessions led by 250+ tech leaders across six industry stages, plus roundtables and breakouts. Meet 300+ exhibiting startups and get hands-on with their latest products. This is where big ideas take shape and deals get sparked.

Don’t miss a moment. Register for your pass and save up to $100. Bring someone with you and save 50% on their pass. If you’ve been affected by a layoff, you can get an Expo+ Pass for just $75. Don’t wait. Lock in your pass now.