Entrepreneurial spirit extends to entertainment at Calgary Innovation Week, taking place Nov. 2 to 5.
Local entrepreneur and master’s student at the University of Calgary’s Haskayne School of Business, Iva Mikulic, will partner with Platform Calgary for its launch party on Nov. 5, an event celebrating the city’s emerging technology startups.
Ahead of Thursday’s launch party, happening from 6 to 9 p.m., the 10 startup finalists will have attended a showcase on Monday night, highlighting early-stage companies like Agrivanna, Black Owl Systems, and Candidly AI.
According to the event’s website, community members nominated the finalists, who then underwent expert review before being announced as the “startups to know before they take off.”
The partnership follows Mikulic’s nomination for her own startup, 999UNVRS, which she founded last April. As a DJ herself, she aims to create opportunities for other local talent by connecting them with industry leaders.
Although she didn’t make this year’s finalists, she said this will be her third time performing at the Platform Innovation Centre, and that being offered the spotlight is just as much an honour.
“They are definitely even partly the reason that I even had the confidence to launch something like this myself because they put me on the stage,” she said.
“It just was very meaningful to kind of get that go-ahead and get that check mark.”
From the stage, to startup, and back again
Having played the venue as an individual DJ and now being invited back as the founder of her own startup, Mikulic said that the event will be a “special full circle moment,” especially provided the backstory of her pursuits.
“As a DJ myself, I realized how difficult it is for emerging artists to get exposure and meaningful performance opportunities,” she said.
“I wanted to create something that gives artists a platform.”
Alongside playing at the launch party, Mikulic said Platform agreed to begin a partnership with her, including hosting DJ boot camps on the weekends, starting at the end of the month.
She said this complements 999UNVRS’s objective of promoting new artists by giving them more visibility, while also making their talent more accessible to people looking to hire musicians.
Mikulic said she is working to improve this while completing her degree, including by building a booking platform and producing music-related advertisements to better connect talent with corporations and private individuals.
With UCalgary serving as the presenting sponsor of Innovation Week, Mikulic said that both her education and music pursuits are further intertwined with the upcoming collaboration, crediting both institutions for catalyzing her business ventures.
“Over the past few years, it kind of nurtured this entrepreneurial spirit that I have,” she said.
“This is just something that I have kind of interwoven throughout my studies and then also just [my] life experience.”
Non-refundable general admission tickets for the launch party include food and cost $50, and groups of 10 or more are eligible for a 10 per cent discount. Tickets are available for purchase online.
