Soda Power Lunch with Hamish Pinkham

Join us for a light lunch and inspiring discussion with the director and co-founder of Rhythm and Vines - Hamish Pinkham. Hamish will share honest, practical lessons from the coalface of building something from nothing - covering entrepreneurship, creative risk-taking, resilience through real adversity, and what it takes to create experiences that truly connect people. You'll also have an opportunity to ask questions. Thanks to our Power Lunch sponsors Ignite and the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. Power Lunch 12.00pm Lunch & networking 12.15pm Guest speaker: Hamish Pinkham 12.30pm Q&A session with Hamish Pinkham 12.45pm Networking 1.30pm Event ends RSVP If you would like to attend, please RSVP by clicking the "Get Tickets" button to the top right. About our speaker Hamish Pinkham is the co-founder and director of Rhythm and Vines, one of New Zealand's most iconic live music festivals - and one of its great entrepreneurial origin stories. In 2003, Hamish and two University of Otago flatmates decided to throw a New Year's party in a Gisborne vineyard. Around 1,800 people showed up. What followed was years of creative ambition, hard lessons, relentless problem-solving, and the kind of tenacity that turns a good idea into something lasting. Rhythm and Vines grew to attract crowds of more than 30,000 and became a fixture on the international festival calendar - not by accident, but through grit, vision, and an unwillingness to quit when things got hard. Since then, Hamish has continued shaping New Zealand's live events landscape. He launched sister festival Rhythm and Alps in Wānaka, built Endeavour Live to produce major music events and international tours, and founded the Phoenix Summit - a one-day gathering of creative leaders and innovators. A qualified lawyer and musician, he brings both commercial sharpness and genuine creative instinct to everything he does. About our sponsor Ignite NZ is a Systems Integrator servicing Waikato, Taranaki and Bay of Plenty. It has around 140 people living local and doing incredible things with technology to support businesses all over these regions. Ignite is the IT Partner for Spark and works closely with Spark to help their clients enhance their digital profile. Ignite provides an array of professional services to help clients determine and execute a digital strategy and offers a range of sourcing and technical services to ensure the right technology solution is designed, deployed and maintained. As a sub-entity of Ignite, Ignite Horizon is investing in local start up entities helping develop new and innovative solutions, and to develop exciting career pathways for local people.