Clowdr

Clowdr is a UK Community Interest Company focused on delivering virtual conferencing software for the academic community. Our software is fully open source and we sell a turnkey service to reduce the effort for conference organisers.

Clowdr started as a response to climate change: ~70% of carbon emissions for a physical conference come from flights and hotels. Virtual conferences can dramatically reduce this carbon footprint. In the short term, Clowdr was prompted by the pandemic and the need for the conferences our founding team call "home" to go virtual. 

Along the way, we've learned that virtual conferences massively expand participation in academic conferences by making them significantly more inclusive for people with disabilities, family responsibilities, caregiving roles, heavy work requirements, geographical restrictions, or limited financial means.

The social experience at a virtual conference makes or breaks the event. This is Clowdr's key focus and we have strong targets for accessibility and inclusivity. 

We believe that, by delivering great virtual conference experiences now, we can convince people to continue holding many of their meetings virtually even after the pandemic is over.