YYC Data Holiday Meetup: Data in Entertainment (Sports & Gaming)

It's the final YYC Data Meetup of 2025!
Join us to wrap up the year with a festive evening of insights, networking, and pizza.

We are taking over the beautiful Helcim office for a special theme: Data in Entertainment.

From the algorithms behind your favorite video games to the data pipelines powering live sports audiences, we are exploring how data shapes the way we have fun.

Location: Helcim HQ
Date: December 9, 2025
Time: Doors @ 5:30 PM | Talks start @ 6:00 PM

The Speakers
1. Michael Wahba – Software Engineer, Maxis (Electronic Arts)
Topic: Data in Games: An Art and Science
Bio: Michael is a software engineer contributing to The Sims franchise. With a background spanning creative direction and lead writing for indie hits like Atrio: The Dark Wild, Michael holds an MFA in Interactive Media from USC.
The Talk: Video games present a unique opportunity where data directly shapes the player experience. Michael will explore how modern games leverage telemetry and player modeling to inform design decisions—from difficulty tuning to encounter pacing. Using industry case studies, he’ll show how designers "wield data like a paintbrush."

2. Trevor Mann – Director of Data Engineering, StellarAlgo
Topic: Evolution of a Data Pipeline
Bio: Trevor has been in the development and data space for 19 years. From working on app/web dev to major international data projects in Oil & Gas, he now leads data engineering in the Sports and Live Audience sector.
The Talk: "Data only works when you design for outcomes, not infrastructure." Trevor will walk us through the evolution of data pipelines and challenge the audience to think about the "why" behind their architecture.

Agenda

• 5:30 PM: Doors Open & Networking
• 6:00 PM: Speaker Presentations + Q&A
• 7:00 PM: Holiday Networking
• 7:30 PM: Wrap up

Who is this for? Data professionals, researchers, game developers, and industry practitioners interested in practical applications and data-driven insights.

RSVP now to save your spot!