Save the date for Founders & Funders Vancouver June 17th

I am pleased to announce the first West Coast Founders & Funders event. I attended the first iteration that took place in January in Toronto, and immediately started scheming with David Crow on how and when to expand it. I just spoke with David, and he’ll be flying out to join us for the event. The next Toronto event is June 4th, and there may be a few slots still available. I missed the Montreal event on May 14th, but I do intend to continue cross pollination with other cities and I hope that other Vancouverites will continue to come along.

After the success and excitement of the visiting VCs at VC Forum last week, I expect several visitors from the US to be in attendance, as well as an excellent selection of local founders and funders.

What:	Founders & Funders Vancouver June 17th Founders & Funders is a private, invite only social event. Founders and Funders is dedicated: to helping Canadian entrepreneurs to meet each other; meet potential funders: angel, VC or other money sources; to have fun; and see how we can help each other create the NEXT BIG successful company.
When:	Wednesday, June 17, 2008 5:30 PM to 10:00 PM

We are limited to 100 seats. The fee for the dinner is $100 which will include drinks and dinner. This is a private networking event and we are selecting the audience to ensure a quality group of attendees. And to provide the best chance to network together.

How do I get an Invite?

If you would like to attend the dinner, please fill out the following form and let us know who you are.

We will be contacting those invited with details on the registration and attendance details for the dinner in the next week.

In addition to Bootup Labs, we are looking for sponsors, so please contact us if you are interested.

Founders and Funders was great, let’s do one in Western Canada

It’s been weeks since I got back from attending the Founders and Funders event in Toronto, and things have finally slowed down from lightspeed enough to put a quick post up here.

David’s wrap up post reiterates the goal:

The goal of Founders & Funders is to create a social environment where the people who fund companies and the people who start companies can begin conversations outside of the pitch.

I decided to go at the last minute, and to leave some time the next day for any meetings that might come up. It was great to see fellow Vancouver-ites David Gratton, Ian Bell, and new-to-me Tom Williams representing there as well. I’ve been maintaining that cross-pollination in Canada is important, and so that was one of the reasons I decided to make the trip.

As it turns out, I made lots of great connections and the trip was certainly well worth it. One of them is an in progress effort to highlight information relevant to Canadian startups, which certainly fits nicely with the goals of Bootup Labs. More on this when it’s real

I have to applaud Microsoft for their support of this initiative. In working with DemoCampVancouver and LaunchParty, we’ve found that what is “small dollars” for firms like Microsoft or Sun can have big effects at the local level. Of course David Crow’s role within the organization makes it easy to directly point to the benefits, but I think we are seeing a bit of a shift in general.

What’s next? Well, I would certainly recommend any future F&F event to funders AND founders. I feel that these events are, like investments themselves, some what local in nature, and as such can and should be held in different areas across the country. I’ve heard rumours of an event in Montreal, and I certainly intend to help put together such an event somewhere west of Winnipeg (likely Calgary or Vancouver). I don’t even have a concrete date in mind yet, but please do leave a comment if you would be interested in such an event.

Finally, kudos to David and Jevon for putting this together in record time. Hope to see you out west sometime soon (hint, hint).