From Hawaii to Utah, Outcove Is the
Exclusive Gathering Changing How Entrepreneurs and Investors Meet.
Sometimes the Best Ideas Happen Off the Clock
On a quiet morning in Hawaii, the air is thick with salt and sunlight. A group of entrepreneurs, investors, and creatives lace up their shoes and head into the lush green mountains. By mid-afternoon, the same crew might be sprawled across a lanai eating miso black cod, calm music in the background, conversations darting between artificial intelligence, and how to recover from burnout. By midnight, they’re dancing barefoot under the moonlight and swapping stories that will linger longer than any LinkedIn connection.
This is Outcove, the brainchild of serial entrepreneur and investors Jess Mah and Noah Berkson, and it is deliberately unlike any retreat or conference you’ve ever heard of. “I didn’t want to build another soulless networking event,” Mah shared, her tone equal parts conviction and mischief. “we wanted to create a container where brilliant people could drop their guard, play, and actually connect.”
Since its first gathering in February 2025, Outcove has been building a reputation as one of the latest invite-only retreats in the startup world. The event is hosted several times a year – so far, once in Hawaii, once in Park City, Utah – and has become a pilgrimage for founders, investors, and operators searching for something beyond the transactional grind of traditional conferences.
Mah and Berkson call it a “venture camp” for entrepreneurs, startup visionaries and investors. They see Outcove as a blueprint for the future, where the most important deals and ideas will be sparked not by rigid agendas but by genuine human connection. In her eyes, the next era of entrepreneurship belongs to communities that can move fast, build trust and create together, whether it is beside a firepit in Hawaii or carving through Utah’s famous champagne powder.
“My vision for Outcove is simple,” Noah Berkson said. “I want people to walk away feeling more alive, more inspired, and more connected than when they arrived. If we can do that, then everything else – deals, partnerships, even love stories – becomes a bonus.”
Table of Contents
The Founder’s Vision for Something Different
Jess Mah’s story begins long before Outcove. She launched her first six-figure business in middle school, went on to co-found more than 10 companies valued in the 9-figures, and built her reputation as one of Silicon Valley’s youngest disruptors. However, despite her success, she found herself restless.
“I was meeting all these incredible people throughout the year – founders, investors, artists, scientists – but our interactions were fragmented,” she explained. “It was coffee here, a rushed dinner there, maybe a Zoom call that felt sterile. I wanted more.”
Berkson shared a similar story, starting and exiting multiple businesses by the age of 32, he still wasn’t finding fulfillment and met many other exited founders who shared the sentiment.
So they built it.
Instead of trying to replicate a formal conference, they set out to design a creative container, something between summer camp and salon, equal parts intimate and electric. “Think of it as if Burning Man had a baby with Davos,” she says, laughing. “But without the desert dust or the pretension.”
That balance – exclusive yet playful, curated but not stiff – is the beating heart of Outcove. The gatherings aren’t monetized or designed to scale. Berkson is clear: this is not a business model, but a passion project.
They referred to it as a “love letter to the community”, something that fills their soul.
The very first Outcove in Hawaii proved the idea had legs. Word of mouth spread fast. The group will reconvene in Park City this winter with a waitlist of entrepreneurs and investors eager to join.
Inside the Outcove Experience
So what actually happens at Outcove? The short answer: a lot….and also not much.
There are no lanyards, no panelists, no rigid agenda. Instead, days are lightly structured around shared activities like group hikes through Hawaii’s cliffs, skiing in the powdery Utah mountains, and communal meals where attendees crowd around long tables piled with local food.
From there, the retreat unfolds organically. Off-the-record discussions emerge around a theme, but without podiums or microphones. Entrepreneurs debate the future of humanity and AI while someone refills smoothie glasses. Founders swap fundraising war stories while enjoying french fries. By night, the focus shifts from dialogue to dance.
“The party energy is not an afterthought – it’s part of the DNA,” Mah said. “When people dance together, laugh together, or sit under the stars at midnight, the walls come down. That’s when the real magic happens.”
One attendee, a fintech founder who later closed a Series A, put it this way: “It doesn’t feel like networking; it feels like summer camp for adults who are making a big difference in the world.”
Berkson doesn’t apologize for blending serious conversations with unapologetic fun. “Life is too short to separate business and play,” he shared with a smile. “Outcove is about designing an environment where people feel alive. And when people feel alive, that’s when they create their best work.”
The vibe is hard to capture in words, but imagine this: one moment you’re perched on a balcony overlooking the ocean, talking about quantum computing with someone you just met. The next, you’re dancing to a live DJ in someone’s living room, barefoot, sweat-slicked, laughing. In between, someone might pull you aside to sketch out a new startup idea on a napkin.
That juxtaposition – serious ideas colliding with joy and chaos – is what gives Outcove its electricity.
They Explains Why It All Matters
For Mah, Outcove is not just about music, meals or mountain air. It is the culmination of more than a decade spent navigating the front lines of entrepreneurship as a young woman in Silicon Valley where she has had to lead teams and enter rooms where she was often the only one who looked like her.
“I have been in boardrooms since I was young,” she said. “I know what it is like to feel pressure to prove myself, to be taken seriously when you are young, female and running a company. That experience made me realize how rare it is to find spaces where people show up as humans first, not résumés.”
For Mah, this is the real return on investment.
“People are hungry for genuine connection,” Berkson added. “Conferences tend to be transactional. Exclusive retreats can feel too curated, almost sterile. Outcove is about breaking both molds. It’s about making space for intimacy and energy at the same time.”
That vision resonates in a startup world increasingly fatigued by “shitty conferences,” as Mah bluntly puts it. “You sit through panels, collect business cards you’ll never use, and fly home drained. I wanted to flip that. People leave Outcove energized.”
It’s not just founders who benefit. Investors who attend often find themselves re-evaluating their own approach to dealmaking and community. “The conversations I’ve had at Outcove shifted how I think about capital,” one investor said. “It reminded me that investing is ultimately about people, not just numbers on a spreadsheet.”
They have no plans to turn Outcove into a brand or franchise, though they hinted at possible future gatherings abroad.
“When you put brilliant, open-hearted people in the same space and let them be human,” she said, “amazing things happen.”