Lone Star TechCON 2027

Sponsorship Terms.

The paperwork, up front: who you are contracting with, how sponsorship is confirmed and paid, what happens if plans change, and what sponsorship does and does not buy. The rate card and tier benefits are on the sponsorship page. A one-page printable version of these terms is available as a PDF.

Part 1 · Terms

Who you are contracting with

Lone Star TechCON is produced by Rural Capital, LLC, a Texas limited liability company doing business as Lone Star TechCON (assumed-name certificate on file with the Texas Secretary of State, August 2026). All contracts, invoices, and payments run through the LLC. A W-9 is available on request.

How sponsorship is confirmed and paid

• A written agreement confirms every sponsorship. Presenting and Gold sponsors sign a short sponsorship agreement; Silver, Community, and named-item sponsors sign a one-page order form that incorporates these terms.
• Inventory hold: we hold a slot for 14 days from the date you ask, while you route approvals. The hold is confirmed by a countersigned agreement.
• Invoicing: the LLC invoices on signature. Payment is net 30, by ACH or check; card payment is available on request. Early-commitment pricing (through October 31, 2026) locks at signature, not at payment.
• In-kind sponsorship (Community tier for nonprofits, user groups, and civic or education partners; donated prizes) is recorded in the agreement at an agreed value.

If plans change

Refunds go to the paying entity by the method it paid.

Insurance and the venue

Rural Capital, LLC carries a special-event general liability policy for the conference dates and setup, at the limits the venue requires. A certificate of insurance is available to sponsors on request. Sponsors are responsible for their own staff, property, and displays on site.

What sponsorship does and does not include

• Includes: the benefits listed for your tier on the rate card, a mutual license to use each other's name and logo to promote the sponsorship, and the passes stated for your tier.
• Does not include: attendee lists or contact data, badge-scan lead capture, speaking slots, or any say over talk selection. Sponsorship buys visibility and the floor, never the stage.
• Exclusives are honored. One Presenting sponsor, one Career Room sponsor, one Wi-Fi sponsor, one Badge sponsor. We do not sell a second version of a sold exclusive.
• Liability. Each side's liability to the other under a sponsorship is limited to the amount of that sponsorship. Neither side is liable to the other for indirect or consequential losses.

Conduct, and our right to decline

All sponsor staff on site follow the event code of conduct, the same as attendees and speakers. Rural Capital, LLC may decline or, with a full refund, end a sponsorship that conflicts with the sponsorship policy below; we do so privately and do not name the company.

Governing law

These terms and every sponsorship agreement are governed by the laws of the State of Texas.

Part 2 · Sponsorship policy

Sponsors don't buy talks

Sponsorship buys visibility and access to the hallway, never the stage.

• Talk selection is blind. The call for proposals is anonymous by design: reviewers see the abstract, not the name, employer, or sponsor status. A sponsor's submission goes through the same blind review as everyone else's, with no advantage and no penalty.
• No sponsored sessions, no pay-to-play panels, no vendor tracks. If a sponsor's engineer has a great talk in them, we want it, through the CFP, on merit.
• The two sponsor stage moments are labeled as what they are: the Presenting sponsor's welcome remarks before the keynote (five minutes, introduced as sponsor remarks) and stage thank-yous. Neither is a session and neither appears on the schedule as content.
• Track naming is naming, not control. A Gold sponsor's name goes on a track; talk selection, session order, and moderation stay with the track chair and the blind CFP.

Attendee data and the floor

• We don't sell or share attendee lists. No badge-scan lead capture, no post-event contact dumps. Sponsors meet attendees the way everyone else does: by being worth talking to at their table.
• The Career Room is opt-in and appointment-based. Job seekers choose to participate at registration. Ordinary recruiting conversations at vendor tables are fine for everyone.
• Swag, demos, and booth prize drawings: yes. A drawing is the consented way to collect contact information: entry is free and optional, the sponsor states what the information will be used for, and all sponsor prizes are drawn at the closing session. The attendee passport game brings every attendee past every sponsor table.
• No sponsor-side badge scanning or lead-retrieval apps. If contact information changes hands, the attendee initiates it.
• One prospectus, one price list. Every prospect gets the same rate card and the same terms. Early-commitment discounts are published; there are no side deals below them.

Categories we decline

We take sponsorship from companies whose products our attendees could plausibly use professionally, and from civic and education partners. We decline, regardless of budget: multi-level marketing and affiliate-recruitment schemes; token sales, speculative-trading platforms, and gambling operations; payday and other high-interest consumer lenders; adult entertainment and tobacco, vape, or cannabis brands; political campaigns, PACs, and advocacy organizations of any stripe; and anything whose presence would undermine the trusted-room promise above. Some categories are decided case by case with organizer sign-off.

Conduct and exclusivity

• All sponsor staff on site are bound by the event code of conduct, the same as attendees and speakers.
• Exclusives mean exclusive. We will not quietly sell a second version of a sold exclusive.
• In-kind sponsorship is real sponsorship, with the same policy and the same code of conduct.
• The organizers hold final decision on accepting or declining any sponsorship.

Rural Capital, LLC dba Lone Star TechCON · Abilene, TX · Terms v1, September 2026