Madison entrepreneurs will join forces this weekend as they participate in a new city business event encouraging young professionals and students to work collaboratively and share ideas to form start-up businesses.
Startup Weekend Madison hopes to facilitate conversations between developers, marketers and designers that may ultimately lead to collaboration and the creation of new businesses, according to a statement from the city. The event, organized by individuals from the University of Wisconsin, Madison Area Technical College and Edgewood College, among others, will take place April 27-29.
According to Ald. Scott Resnick, District 8, the event will serve as a forum to launch a new initiative by the city to provide data to the public. Resnick said datasets utilized by city officials, including school system data, voting locations and transportation information, will be available for purposes of transparency and accountability.
The datasets will also provide young entrepreneurs with information to create mobile applications, Resnick said. Communities in New York and Chicago have utilized city datasets for similar purposes, particularly for transportation applications.
“This is a huge, huge step forward for Madison,” Resnick said. “Industry-wise, people are really talking about it.”
Entrepreneurs participating in Startup Weekend Madison will be the first to be able to use the city datasets, which may prove to be advantageous in creating new products or startup businesses.
“Basically all the right players will be in the right room, so we thought it was a perfect time to announce the availability of the datasets,” Resnick said.
Startup Weekend Madison organizer Forrest Woolworth said the event will kick off Friday evening with introduction activities and speakers. Participants will then group together to share ideas and potentially begin to formulate ideas for products or startup businesses. The groups will present their ideas at the event’s end on Sunday.
The statement noted the event is one of the largest and well-known in its entrepreneurial field in the world.
“Madison is the perfect location for this event,” Mayor Paul Soglin said in the statement. “The combination of the UW, Madison College, and Edgewood in conjunction with startup entrepreneurs provides a great environment for this innovative event. The City of Madison Information Technology Department has been working with organizers to prepare for this event. The city welcomes all of the attendees, and I look forward to visiting with many participants.”
Resnick added the city will provide IT professionals and online tutorials for event participants interested in utilizing city datasets to create a product or service.
According to the statement, young businesses have played an integral part in Madison’s economy by providing the community with jobs and raising significant amounts of capital. The statement also stressed the importance of entrepreneurship to the city’s economy, adding that Madison was rated as one of the top 10 cities to start a business in.
Startup Weekend Madison is part of the city’s Capital Entrepreneurs Week, which begins April 25 with several educational and networking activities targeted at young entrepreneurs in the area.
The event is sponsored by Google, Earth Information Technologies and Epic Systems, among area businesses, according to Woolworth.
