DST Expand North Star 2026
Dubai Exhibition Centre, Expo City, Dubai · Organized by GITEX Global
- Dates
- Dec 8, 2026 – Dec 10, 2026
- Format
- In person
- Where
- Dubai Exhibition Centre, Expo City, Dubai
- Organizer
- GITEX Global
GITEX fills the Trade Centre in October with companies that already have customers. Six weeks later the same organisers fill Expo City with the ones that do not yet.
Expand North Star 2026 dates
Expand North Star runs 8–10 December 2026 at the Dubai Exhibition Centre in Expo City. It is the tenth edition, and it is organised by GITEX Global.
The size of it, as measured last year
The 2025 edition drew 2,050 exhibiting startups from 96 countries, more than 1,300 investors, 6,500 founders and 400 speakers, with 5,340 pre-arranged meetings booked on site. The organisers describe the investor cohort as managing more than $1 trillion in assets between them.
What is inside it
Five components carry the programme. Founders Academy is a three-day learning track. NS Play covers AR, VR and lifestyle technology. DigiHealth-Biotech takes healthcare. The Investor Programme is billed by the organisers as the largest VC gathering in the global south, and Supernova 0X is the pitch competition, structured by venture stage rather than by sector.
Around them sit a Founder's Pass giving access to single-day startup pods, and thematic tracks on restructuring, alternative capital, commercial deep tech and emerging-market growth corridors.
The number to plan around is 5,340 pre-arranged meetings, not the 2,050 exhibitors. This is a matching event rather than a browsing one, and the value is almost entirely in the meeting scheduler, which opens weeks before the doors do. A stand booked without the meetings booked is a stand in a hall of two thousand other stands. Note also the venue: Expo City is not the World Trade Centre, and the December date puts it well clear of GITEX week — anyone budgeting one Dubai trip for both is budgeting two.
Source: Expand North Star checked against the source
