fenel at NRTH Festival 2026

fenel is heading to NRTH Festival in Toronto this week, joining founders, innovators, investors, creators, and business leaders from across Canada’s technology ecosystem.

And there are a few conversations we’re especially excited about.

Fandom. Community. Creators. IRL.

If you’ve been following what we’re building at fenel, you’ll probably understand why several sessions at NRTH immediately caught our attention.

We’re looking forward to hearing from Toronto Raptors legend and six-time NBA All-Star Kyle Lowry, who will sit down for a fireside chat about his career, his relationship with Toronto, and how he cultivates a winning mindset.

But we’re also watching conversations about the future of fandom itself.

Jacie deHoop, co-founder of The GIST, will share how the company identified a gap in traditional sports media and built a community reaching more than 40 million fans. Her session explores authentic community, the opportunity surrounding female fandom, and how brands can build meaningful strategic partnerships around it.

That conversation continues with Streaming, Social, and Superfans: The Future of Sports Entertainment, featuring Katie Heindl, Vanessa Podesta of Fubo, Paul Matthews of Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, and Jacie deHoop.

They’re tackling a question we think about every day at fenel:

How is fandom changing when fans are participating everywhere?

At the stadium. On social. On streaming platforms. At activations. In communities. At watch parties. And increasingly, across all of them at once.

We’re also looking forward to Cultivating Online Creator Communities, IRL, with Wattpad’s Head of Creators & Community Caitlin O’Hanlon and author Jessica Cunsolo.

Their conversation around trust, belonging, and creating spaces where creators and their audiences can connect feels especially relevant as the boundaries between online communities and real-world experiences continue to disappear.

That’s the world fenel is building for

fenel is building an IRL memory hub for fandom, events, and communities.

Fandom is increasingly something we experience together. Fans take photos and videos with other fans. They capture moments with athletes and creators. They participate in brand experiences and community events.

fenel gives everyone a place to share those moments: bringing the photos, videos, people, and experiences of fandom into one shared visual world.

A fan can share a moment with another fan. An athlete can share with their community. A brand can be part of the experience. And those moments can keep building across events over time.

Because fandom isn’t just something we consume.

It’s something we create together.

The conversations shaping the next era of fandom

What excites us most about these conversations at NRTH is that they point to a much bigger shift happening across sports, entertainment, and community.

Fandom is becoming more participatory. More community-driven. More IRL.

Fans aren’t simply audiences anymore. They’re creators, organizers, community members, and participants in the experience itself. Athletes are becoming creators and community builders. Brands are looking beyond impressions toward genuine participation. And digital communities are increasingly finding ways to bring those relationships into the real world.

We’re particularly interested in the questions this creates:

• How do we design for superfans?
• How do online communities translate into meaningful IRL experiences?
• How is women’s fandom changing sports media and brand partnerships?
• What does authentic participation between fans, athletes, creators, and brands actually look like?
• And how do we understand the relationships being created across all of these experiences?

These are exactly the conversations we want to be part of at NRTH.

At fenel, we’re building for a future where fandom isn’t measured only by what people watch, click, or buy, but by how they show up, participate, connect, and create memories together.

We look forward to hearing what Kyle Lowry, Jacie deHoop, Caitlin O’Hanlon, Jessica Cunsolo, Katie Heindl, Vanessa Podesta, Paul Matthews, and the wider NRTH community have to say about where all of this is heading.

See you at NRTH.