April Events Roundup: From ProductCamp to build nights, IRL tech meetups are officially back in Pittsburgh

Events Roundup is a Technical.ly column where we highlight events happening in the Pittsburgh area each month. Got a submission? Email us the details so we can consider it for our next roundup: pittsburgh@technical.ly.

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Got spring fever? Use that extra energy to pack your calendar with tons of great events happening in the Pittsburgh tech and startup community.

Almost all of the big events coming up in April are free to attend, and many feature a chance to learn new skills or lessons in software development and entrepreneurship. Even better, many events that used to be held regularly and in-person before the pandemic are making a return, including the famed ProductCamp. There will be a few chances to catch a glimpse at Pittsburgh’s tech future, too, with an information session on an upcoming startup studio and a look ahead to the new year from one of the largest civic organizations in town.

If the first quarter of this year is any signifier of the activity Pittsburgh tech will see in 2022, these community-building events aren’t ones you’ll want to miss.

Code & Supply Build Night

This open work event is a chance to connect with others in Code & Supply’s software development community and offer help on a variety of projects. Attendees have the freedom to choose what they’d like to work on and the event is open to all languages, frameworks, open-source projects or personal ones. This popular event is already fully booked due to COVID limitations, but be sure to join the waitlist for a chance to attend.

• Monday, March 28, 6 to 9 p.m.
• Code & Supply Community Center, 5648 Friendship Ave, 3rd Floor
• Free to attend

Better Work Ventures Info Session

Local founder and serial entrepreneur Lynsie Campbell has been sharing a slew of updates on Twitter about the formation of a new startup studio, Better Work Ventures (fka Hooman), with cofounder Nathaniel Minto. The two will be fielding questions on what exactly a startup studio is, what types of companies it’ll be supporting, the dynamic between startup founders and the studio, what types of investments are involved and more.

• Thursday, March 31, noon to 1 p.m.
• Online event
• Free to attend

ProductCamp Pittsburgh

An in-person version of this annual event is back for the first time since before the pandemic, after being postponed last year and held virtually in 2020. Labeled as an “un-conference,” ProductCamp brings together product managers, product marketing professionals, innovators, marketers, designers, CxOs, founders, engineers, researchers and more for an active and free-flowing conference centered on discussions around the best practices and insights in the local product community.

• Saturday, April 2, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
• Dick’s Sporting Goods Headquarters, 345 Court Street, Coraopolis, PA 15108
• Free to attend

Invest in Women x Pittsburgh

This event comes out of a partnership between Ascender, Chloe Capital and the Richard King Mellon Foundation launched at the end of last year to share resources and funding opportunities with local women entrepreneurs. This in-person event, which requires proof of vaccination with masks strongly encouraged, will be catered specifically toward aspiring entrepreneurs or early stage startup founders who are looking for funding, as well as investors looking to make new deals.

• Wednesday, April 6, 4 p.m. to 5 p.m.
• Ascender, 6401 Penn Ave.
• Free to attend

Project Olympus Show & Tell 

Hosted by Carnegie Mellon University’s Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, the Project Olympus Show & Tell event features presentations and networking opportunities for the CMU innovation community. This 25th event in the series, which has been taking place since June 2007, will highlight local exits, founders, emerging startups and more from CMU, including VIT (now under SWORD Health), Mach9 Robotics, E-Carebetics, the Pittsburgh Innovation District and more.

• Thursday, April 7, 4 to 6 p.m.
• Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, Tepper School of Business, 3rd Floor, 4765 Forbes Ave.
• Free to attend

Start Smart Law: Worst Mistakes Made By Startups

The Start Smart Law series from the University of Pittsburgh’s Big Idea Center features startup lawyers from K&L Gates, who share insight on business operations and other legal processes involved with growing a company. Panelists are still being finalized for this event, but those who join will hear lawyers’ stories of the biggest mistakes they’ve encountered in advising startups, and how founders in attendance can hope to avoid them.

• Tuesday, April 19, 5 to 6:30 p.m.
• Online event
• Free to attend

Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership Annual Meeting

The 2022 annual meeting of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership will take a look back at business and community trends in 2021, based on the organization’s 2021 annual report, which has not yet been released. Beyond a chance for some continental breakfast and networking, Mayor Ed Gainey will be at the event as the keynote speaker.

• Thursday, April 28, 7:45 to 9:30 a.m.
• Pittsburgh Playhouse, 350 Forbes Ave.
• $20 for partnership members, $30 for non-members

AI & Robotics Venture Fair

Hosted by Innovation Works and CMU, the AI & Robotics Venture Fair will return for its fifth consecutive year to bring together a showcase of some of the best artificial intelligence and robotics startups throughout the Midwest. Applications for startups are open through Sunday, Apr. 3. The event will also kick off a three-day automation and AI conference hosted by investment bank Cascadia Connect, which has partnered with IW, CMU’s School of Computer Science and the Pittsburgh Robotics Network and is actively looking for a company to buy in that space.

• Monday, May 2, 3 to 5:30 p.m.
• The Fairmont Pittsburgh, 510 Market St.
• Cost not listed

Sophie Burkholder is a 2021-2022 corps member for Report for America, an initiative of The Groundtruth Project that pairs young journalists with local newsrooms. This position is supported by the Heinz Endowments.