On February 13th, 2024, successful University of Waterloo alumni are going to be available to 15 high-quality student lead founding teams to learn about who they are and what they are working on. The day will include small group and large group meetings where founders will have the chance to build meaningful connections with people who have built something from start to success.
This day is being organized in partnership with Communitech and the University of Waterloo's Faculty of Engineering.
Applications are open to any founding team that has University of Waterloo students or very recent alumni (class of 2023) who are building a company. Some of the alumni in the room have significant experience building and funding deep tech, others know software, some med tech, etc. The experience and knowledge are broad. Do not self-select out because you think you might not be a 'fit' -- apply and let us figure that out!
The meetings will respect privacy and confidentiality. They will operate under Chatham House Rules. Please do not treat this as a pitch competition!
How will the day work?
This is a day-long event. In the morning you will have small group meetings where you will talk about what you are building, your founding team, and get to know the alumni.
In the afternoon you will get in the room with the larger group of alumni and have a follow-up conversation. But this time you get to hear them talk about your company. In that conversation is an opportunity for you, the founder, to gain insight into not only how investors think but its opportunity to gain access to a network.
Waterloo alumni have built things
The Waterloo community has had an abundance of talented people who live in the community and go to school here. Some stay and build companies. Most can be found across every startup ecosystem in Canada and the US along with a significant amount of building companies on every continent.
Who will be there?
To give you some idea of who will be there - Irfan Ahmed, Steven Woods, Eldon Sprickerhoff.
There will be 10-20 alumni in attendance that day.
A Startupbarn project
This event is organized by the Startupbarn. Born out of the Eigenspace program, Startupbarn is focused on building a strong startup ecosystem by connecting people through community tools.