Meaningful ideas and changes are sparked when serendipitous connection collides with intention. The Thursday Gathering is our free, weekly meet-up that connects people from across Edinburgh’s innovation community to make things happen. Every Thursday, we bring together innovators of all backgrounds, from founders and investors to students and researchers, to discuss big ideas and connect human to human.
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If you require accessibility assistance or special accommodations, please contact us at hello@venturecafeedinburgh.org ahead of the event.
Grab a drink, and join the conversation! Whether you're looking to meet potential collaborators, exchange ideas, grow your network, or simply continue the conversation, this is a great opportunity to connect with fellow innovators, entrepreneurs, and members of the community. You never know where a conversation might lead!
Take a seat and hear from Venture Café Edinburgh Director, Claudia Cavalluzzo who will go through how to make the most of a Thursday Gathering and give you a quick preview of what's in line for this week's event.
Venture Café is a global movement built on a simple but powerful belief: isolation is the enemy of innovation.
At our weekly Thursday Gatherings, we connect creators, entrepreneurs, investors, coworkers, students and visionaries to build strong, inclusive and equitable innovation ecosystem. As ecosystem activators, Venture Café Edinburgh is creating a central hub for the city's innovation ecosystem, driving visibility, collaboration and community.
And if you’d like to get more involved with Venture Café, there are plenty of ways to join our network:
🤝 Become a partner
🎤 Speak at an upcoming Thursday Gathering
🙌 Join our ambassador team
The global consumer games industry is worth a staggering $213 billion, but the transformative potential of game innovation is much bigger. Game design principles and play dynamics also teach us about human behaviour, develop skills and drive engagement. Games technology is used for visualisation, sandboxing and simulation from sectors as diverse as advance manufacturing to healthcare. Game design principles, tools and methodologies can support multiple business challenges; from creating better customer engagement and retention to improving accessibility or workflows or making learning and development more fun.
Session host Brian Baglow, is the author of Level Up Scotland, Scotland’s Games Action Plan – a blueprint for growing the sector and establishing games as a national priority. As Founder of the Scottish Games Network, its More Than Games initiative connects games studios with other sectors to solve real-world challenges. Join us for a session on playful thinking.
You’ll hear from companies who are using game innovation and immersive technologies to tackle challenges and create new opportunities with use cases from financial services, defence, edtech, creative industries and more. Think you’re not a gamer? Think again.
In this week's Innovator Spotlight series, hear from:
Hilary Young, Co-Founder & Director of Operations at Forumm
Adam Barnard, Non-Academic Lead at ASPBelong