Tonight I attended Edmonton’s first Launch Party, and I’m happy to report that it was awesome! Including the presenting companies, investors, and media, there were about 250 people in attendance, a fantastic turnout and great show of support for Edmonton’s startup scene. There was food, drinks, a DJ, great conversation, and of course, some of Edmonton’s best and brightest entrepreneurs and developers.
Ten local companies setup tables around the room, available to demo their products and to talk with potential investors and customers. Each company also got to do an elevator pitch in front of the entire crowd (and all of them did a great job). I wrote about the companies here, but once again, here are the ten that participated tonight:
- Beamdog
- Connect13
- Edistorm
- Empire Avenue
- FotoJournal
- Mailout Interactive
- PureInbox
- Seek Your Own Proof
- SnowSeekers
- Yardstick Software
Each company had a slightly different approach to greeting interested individuals, but Yardstick stood out. They had margarita machines at their table, and gave out free drinks all evening long! Overall, I’d say the event had the same kind of vibe as an artsScene party (for a quick look at what the evening was like, check out this video).
I asked as many of the companies as I could about their thoughts on the evening. All of them told me that the opportunity to meet so many people at once was truly valuable. And the opportunity to meet with such different people too – investors, techies, customers, etc. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves while learning about the companies.
Like many of the people I talked to tonight, I was impressed with the diversity of the crowd. I feel like I know a lot of people in the local tech community, and there were a lot of people there tonight that I had never met before! It was like a bunch of different communities came together, which is really important for growing the local startup scene.
Kudos to Mark, Ken, Cindy, and Cam for putting on an excellent event. Can’t wait for the next one! Stay tuned to the Startup Edmonton site, and follow them on Twitter for updates.
You can see the rest of my photos here. You can watch Ken welcoming everyone here.
MasterMaq's Blog 
I have to say, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I came to Launch Party last night – but am I ever glad I went! I met so many new and interesting people, found out about companies I didn’t know existed, and had a delicious margarita, courtesy of YardStick.
Mark, Ken, Cindy, and Cam – keep this up! The party was phenomenal, and I can’t wait to see what comes out of Startup Edmonton. Like Mack said, I can’t wait for the next one either.
This was such a great night. Can you do one every week?
Great report, Mack. And SOOOOOOO timely.
Nice recap Mack. We certainly had a blast. Looking forward to the next one!
This event had a lot of energy! Great opportunity to meet entrepreneurs with a plethora of expertise. As always, love the review Maq – looking forward to your take on TEDx Edmonton.
Thanks everyone for coming and helping make this first Launch Party a success! Glad you all had such a great time. We sure did. It went way beyond our expectations! On to planning the next one…