November 14 will mark yet another exciting event. In collaboration with ICUBE UTM, HackerNest Mississauga is proud to be hosting its final tech social for 2016 at the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM). If you already know how awesome this night is going to be networking with students, alumni and industry, click here to register and come back to find out more!
Established in 2011, the Toronto-born, nonprofit organization has built local tech communities all around the world. It aims to improve economic development for healthier and happier living.
Yet, through budding entirely by word-of-mouth, HackerNest tech socials have grown to become one of Canada’s largest gatherings. Routinely, meetups attract smart technologists from all over the world.
The non-profit organization also accommodates a myriad of interest. There are alternatives if socials aren’t quite what you are looking for. In addition to geeky meet-ups, HackerNest also produces large, universally lauded hackathons.
Apart from giving attendees the chance to create working prototypes, hackathons also encourage creativity, camaraderie, innovation and mentorship. Specifically, events such as Hack4Equality was a 7-week hackathon aimed at combating LGBTQ inequality. Participants had to craft technology-based solutions to critical issues faced globally by the LGBTQ communities.
Similarly, as an incubator and business accelerator, ICUBE UTM strongly believes hackathons are great value-drivers. On March 5th, ICUBE UTM teamed up with Sheridan College and the City of Mississauga to host its first International Open Data hackathon. It was a sold out event.
Currently, HackerNest is embarking on developing HackerNest Unite—a unified directory platform and community portal that’ll help people navigate an ecosystem’s vast resources. As a result, HackerNest’s finesse has propelled the once humble start up, to now expanding over 30 cities across 14 countries, with over 35,000 participating members.
In a recent conversation with tech social organizers of HackerNest Mississauga, David Soo and James Nguyen shared their motivation behind bringing HackerNest to Canada’s 6th largest city.
“I delivered the first public Hackathon event on behalf of the City of Mississauga, last March,” said UX designer and entrepreneur at heart, David. “It was a collaborative effort between government and education to create a development community within our city (check out Code and the City). Subsequently, our Hackathon presenting sponsor, SOTI Inc., had expressed a strong interest in bringing Tech Socials to Mississauga. They reached out to HackerNest with the proposal and it was accepted. In short, we want to build a strong tech community in Mississauga with clear lines of communication between business, education, government, and the public.”
Additionally, David expressed his enthusiasm for HackerNest Mississauga as an event for “breaking barriers”. He described it as a creative outlet for attendees to make new friends, gain new ideas and collaboration opportunities.
“It’s all about open lines of communication where egos are dropped and everyone is on a level playing ground, all disciplines inclusive. We operate in a culture where teamwork and collaboration is king.”
HackerNest Mississauga Tech Social will be hosted by ICUBE, and held at Spigel Hall UTM (map) from 8:00 to 11:00 pm through entry by donation. It is a great way for first time tech-social attendees (including students) to meet other tech enthusiasts, and leverage their interest. As such, come join us for an exciting night of mingling, pizza and beer.
Notable sponsors that will join HackerNest Mississauga for the event include SOTI Inc., Lighthouse Labs, Sheridan College, Code Master Challenge, and ICUBE UTM.
For full details and schedule, please visit HackerNet Mississauga
