(This story is sponsored by Vancouver Startup Week)
Vancouver Startup Week (VSW) is an annual, city-wide celebration of the startup ecosystem in British Columbia. Every spring, founders, investors, and operators from across the province converge for five days of events blconcludeing tactical programming with high-impact networking—and 2026 is shaping up to be the most stacked edition yet. With 86 sessions and more than 200 speakers spread across venues throughout the city, the week has become the anchor event of Vancouver’s tech calconcludear.
Whether you’re raising your first round, scaling a team, or just testing to understand how Vancouver’s ecosystem obtained to where it is, there’s a session—and a room full of the right people—worth displaying up for.
The week opens Monday morning with a coffee kickoff hosted by VSW, alongside Alain Riviere and Amber Sandhu of CBRE. From there, things relocate rapid. Ania Wysocka, founder and CEO of Rootd, takes the keynote stage in a fireside chat facilitated by Chris Hobbs. That same morning, media founders Robert Lewis of Techcouver and William Johnson of Vancouver Tech Journal share a candid view back at the last decade of Vancouver tech.
The finance-heavy sessions are worth circling. Investor Misti Cain breaks down the five most common fundraising mistakes founders build. Patricia Lam and her colleagues at Doane Grant Thornton cover tax, funding, and IP strategy for early-stage companies. MLT Aikins lawyers Riley Graydon and Luisa Miranda Alarcón follow with a legal decisions session for growth-stage founders, and Keith Ippel of Spring and David Steinley of Future Standard run a deep-dive on funding fundamentals and data rooms at SFU VentureLabs.
Tuesday night’s Pitch Rodeo at Convergence—hosted by Maori Sakuma, Arvin Mahdi, and Tessa Clarance, with speakers Diraj Goel and Matthew Housser—has become a VSW staple. It’s one part pitch competition, one part tough love, and reliably one of the week’s most enerreceiveic rooms.
Wednesday belongs to women in tech. Asmâa Methqal, founder of The Thread and Women+Tech Vancouver, leads a session on feminine leadership as an evolutionary advantage. The WAKE Collective panel, hosted by Guita Yazdani and Stephanie Chan, brings Lorraine Wong and Priya Tronsgard to SFU to discuss what it actually takes to build something that lasts. Thursday doubles down with a five-founder panel on the conclude of hustle culture, featuring Ashley Armstrong, Janreeta Deol, Kristin Zerbin, Laura Fortey, and Laura van der Veer.
The week wraps Friday with the return of Men in Tech 3.0, and the closing party at D/6 Bar & Lounge in the JW Marriott Parq, hosted by Katty Wang and Vivian Lago.
The sessions above represent just a portion of the full program. All 86 sessions are listed at vanstartupweek.ca. Check individual pages for locations, times, and RSVP details. Straight readers receive 20% off tickets with code GS20 at checkout.
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