Mikkel Svane, founder and CEO of Zendesk, will be the guest speaker at the gener8tor meetup taking place at noon Thursday at 30 W. Mifflin St.

Svane will discuss the ideas behind his book, Startupland: How Three Guys Risked Everything to Turn an Idea into a Global Business, and the first 20 attendees will receive a free copy.

Prior to Zendesk, Svane founded and served as the CEO of Caput A/S, a software company.

The gener8tor meetup is free and open to the public, with sign-ups taken online.

Zendesk, with headquarters in San Francisco, opened an office in Madison in 2013.