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Today I'm sitting down with Zack Storms and Adrian Mitchell from Startup TNT. Zack is co-founder and Adrian is the Calgary lead.

StartupTNT transformed their weekly happy hour meetups into becoming Canada's most active angel investment network, connecting founders with funders and reshaping prairie entrepreneurship one community at a time.

• Zack launched Startup TNT in Edmonton in 2019 with weekly happy hours to build better angel investor networks.
• Adrian joined in 2023.
• Now Canada's number one pre-seed investor by deal count, deploying millions across Alberta, Saskatchewan, and beyond.
• Startup TNT lowers barriers to angel investing with $5,000 minimum investments instead of traditional $25,000-$50,000 cheques.
• Network effect enables 20-40% of local investments to come from outside each community.
• Alberta's startup ecosystem has grown from $200M annual investment to $600-$800M since TNT's founding.
• Regular Thursday happy hours (6-9pm) in each city create consistent community gathering spaces.
• Expanding nationally with specialized summits like their agri-food investment focus.
• Team partnering with Inventures 2024 for pitch showcase featuring Alberta's most promising startups.
• Newly hired executive director, CK Dhaliwal will allow founding team to focus on scaling across North America.

Visit InventuresCanada.com to get your ticket for Inventures and StartupTNT.com to learn more about their upcoming happy hours, investment summits, and how to participate as an entrepreneur or investor.

Shift by Alberta Innovates focuses on the people, businesses and organizations that are contributing to Alberta's strong tech ecosystem.

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What happens when a talent acquisition strategy evolves into a national movement connecting Canada's fragmented tech ecosystems? Philippe Burns, recently named one of Calgary's top innovators in Avenue Magazine, reveals the remarkable journey behind Tech Thursday—a grassroots event series that's become the beating heart of Alberta's innovation community.

From its humble beginnings as a Neo Financial recruitment initiative to its current status as an independent company hosting 175+ events with over 20,000 attendees, Tech Thursday represents a masterclass in community-building. The secret? Creating casual environments where meaningful connections happen organically, without the forced networking that plagues so many tech events.

Burns introduces us to the "flywheel effect"—the powerful cycle where successful tech companies spawn new ventures, creating self-reinforcing momentum that transforms entire regions. This pattern, witnessed in innovation hotspots worldwide, is emerging in Alberta's ecosystem, with Neo Financial (itself a Skip the Dishes offshoot) now catalyzing numerous startups.

Most compelling is Tech Thursday's mission to dissolve boundaries between traditionally isolated Canadian tech communities. Their expansion to Edmonton and Ottawa aims to facilitate crucial cross-city relationships between investors, founders, and talent. As Burns explains, "We're adding more cities, but we're also connecting investors, founders, maybe their first engineering hire between these cities as well, so we can build a stronger Canadian-wide tech hub."

For founders and community builders alike, this candid conversation offers invaluable insights into balancing ambition with authenticity, quantity with quality, and hype with genuine value. Ready to contribute to Alberta's innovation flywheel? Reach out to Philippe directly on LinkedIn with your ideas for speakers, topics, or feedback.

Shift by Alberta Innovates focuses on the people, businesses and organizations that are contributing to Alberta's strong tech ecosystem.

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The challenge of plastic waste demands innovative solutions, especially when we confront the startling reality that only nine percent of plastics worldwide are currently being recycled.

NAIT's Dr. Muhammad Arshad reveals how the Polytechnic's initiative Plastic Research in Action is tackling this problem, specifically through groundbreaking work on polymer blends in the Designing for Circularity: Development of polypropylene blends using post-consumer recycled plastic program.

For the past two years, Dr. Arshad's team has been working with their industry partners Heartland Polymers to develop and test formulations that combine virgin polypropylene with post-consumer recycled plastics. Their research delves into the complex realities of plastic recycling—how materials degrade through multiple processing cycles, why multi-layer packaging frustrates recycling efforts, and what formulations might maintain performance quality while incorporating recycled content. Now moving from bench testing to pilot scale, their partnership with Heartland Polymers shows promise for creating commercially viable solutions.

The conversation illuminates the entire lifecycle of plastic products, from petroleum-based production through consumer use to disposal and potential reuse. We discover why 100% recycled plastic products aren't always feasible for high-performance applications and how blending virgin and recycled materials offers a practical middle ground. Beyond the technical aspects, Dr. Arshad highlights NAIT's partnerships across diverse sectors—from industrial manufacturers to Alberta's beekeeping industry—showing how circular economy principles can be applied across our economy.

This interview with Dr. Arshad is related to the interview The circular economy unplugged with insights from Alberta Innovates' Mehr Nikoo.

Ready to support plastic sustainability? Choose reusable products over single-use items, select products containing recycled content, and ensure you're following proper recycling guidelines in your community. Listen now to understand how Alberta researchers are transforming what we've traditionally viewed as waste into valuable resources for our future.

Additional reading:

• Economic Study of the CANADIAN PLASTIC INDUSTRY, MARKETS AND WASTE (opens a pdf)
• Zero Plastic Waste

Shift by Alberta Innovates focuses on the people, businesses and organizations that are contributing to Alberta's strong tech ecosystem.