NOVA Matchmaking Event

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UPCOMING EVENT

15 OCTOBER 2026 · SALÃO NOBRE · COLÉGIO ALMADA DE NEGREIROS

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Meet Your Next Co-Founder

What if your co-founder is studying at a different NOVA school?

Registrations are now open for a new edition of the NOVA Matchmaking Event, bringing together students and researchers from across all 10 NOVA schools interested in entrepreneurship, innovation and new ideas. Organised by NOVA Impact and NOVA FCSH, this edition is an opportunity for meeting people from different schools, different skill sets and discover new possibilities for collaboration. If you’re looking for a co-founder, a teammate for your next project or just someone or simply want to meet interesting people and exchange ideas, this it for you.

You don't need a startup, a business plan or even a fully formed idea. Just bring your curiosity.

The NOVA Matchmaking Event was originally developed in collaboration with Nova SBE Haddad Entrepreneurship Institute.

Who can join?

All NOVA Bachelor's, Master's and PhD students and researchers from any of the 10 NOVA schools.

What will happen?

You can pitch your project if you have one, or just listen to the pitches and see if something feels like a good fit.

There will time to talk, mingle and connect, drinks and nibbles are on us!

Save the date:

15 October | 4:00–6:00 PM
Salão Nobre, Colégio Almada de Negreiros — Campolide Campus

We'll bring the space and the drinks. You bring the curiosity.

Register by 13th of October 11.59am.

Your next co-founder might be closer than you think.

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Check out what happened in previous Matchmakings!

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Tomás Adão da Fonseca

Susana Carvalho e Silva

Sérgio Coimbra Henriques

Sandra Miranda Ferreira

Ricardo Gaminha Pacheco

Rafael Oliveira Rodrigues

Lourenço Gouveia Booth

José Falcão de Berredo

Eduardo Freire Rodrigues

Patrick Sharbaugh

Short biography Patrick Sharbaugh is a design strategist, facilitator, and educator with 15 years of experience working with globally recognized enterprises, international universities, startups, and incubators. He's created and led large communities around innovation and design in Melbourne, Australia, and Portland, Oregon. As a VP of Community and Customer Engagement at Aquent, he led a national (US) community of 100+ senior in-house designers from some of the most recognized brands in the world. He's been a coach and mentor for the Stanford Graduate School of Business' LISA/LEAD program, and an advisor to American startup Masa Fresh, which was joined Techstars' Social Impact Accelerator program in 2023 (Atlanta). In his work with LUMA Institute, he's helped enterprises from Accenture and Microsoft to The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Nike and Starbucks create more innovative, design-led cultures, and he leads the Lisbon Chapter of Voltage Control's international Facilitation Lab. Main skills Innovation and startup culture, outcome-based facilitation, strategic design, problem framing, team building and alignment, change management, bottom-up design, coaching and instruction, community building, value proposition refinement, product-market fit, business model generation, ideation and brainstorming, rapid iteration, user testing, ethnographic field research. Areas of interest for mentoring User Research. Problem definition and problem framing. Team building and alignment. Facilitation. Value proposition refinement. Product-market fit. Business model generation. Ideation and brainstorming. Rapid iteration. User testing. Motivation to be a mentor Nothing makes me happier than working with people as a coach, mentor and instructor to help them understand the power of a user-led approach to product and service development. Availability for mentoring sessions
  • Face to face;
  • Online meeting.