Capital/Investment

Taking a hands-on interest in startups

Rowser — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:01:30 -0400

Author

John Pollack

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Wednesday March 10th, 2010

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http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/rss/article/978986

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‘It’s important for our entrepreneurs to understand what it takes to raise venture financing,’ says Peter Clark, regional investment manager with GrowthWorks Atlantic Inc. Photo by: David Smith/For the Telegraph-Journal

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Investment manager Peter Clark wants to see New Brunswick entrepreneurs thrive

As an investment manager partially responsible for a $35-million fund Peter Clark likes to hear about great businesses with innovative products.

GrowthWorks Atlantic Ltd.'s regional investment manager for New Brunswick is even happier when experienced and knowledgeable people run those startup businesses.

"They're the ones who are going to be leading and building the companies," he says, adding he likes to get to know entrepreneurs long before he makes an investment.

Clark's job is to help companies his firm has invested in and finding new leads, so he is constantly networking and talking to people about their businesses.

He wants to help more New Brunswick entrepreneurs thrive not only to further economic development cause, but also because it creates more investment opportunities.

GrowthWorks Atlantic - which focuses primarily on IT, life sciences and cleantech - is paying for leaders of six startup companies, all part of Propel ICT Inc.'s accelerator program, to attend the R3 Gala in Fredericton with Clark next week. Silicon Valley investor and entrepreneurial guru Guy Kawasaki will be the keynote speaker at the event and Clark has read some of his books and seen him present before.

"He's obviously experienced in the area of startup companies and what it takes for them to raise venture financing.

"It's important for our entrepreneurs to understand what it takes to raise venture financing," Clark says.

The event will also give him a chance to get to know the six entrepreneurs in a more relaxed environment where no one is trying to negotiate a deal.

"I'm just looking to understand their backgrounds and what makes them passionate about what they are leading," he says. "And where they see the company in the near future."

Having come to the venture capital business from "the other side of the table," Clark says he knows what the startups are going through.

Before joining GrowthWorks, Clark was involved in expanding multiple businesses, some of them very small. Most recently he was vice-president of finance and corporate development for Woodstock-based Barrett Xplore Inc., until 2006.

The biggest piece of advice he has for startups is to know their market - what the customer wants and what they are willing to pay for it.

"Too often early stage companies define a product they want to build and not necessarily what the market is willing to pay for," he says. "Make sure your customer or potential customer is involved in the (development) process."

For a software company this could mean rolling out a beta or first version and getting feedback while constantly developing. When this model doesn't work, startups need to get sample customers to give feedback throughout development, Clark says.

"Don't wait until the product is perfect before you take it to market," he says. "The only one that will tell you it is perfect is the customer and they need to be involved the whole way."

When it comes to making the $500,000 to $4-million investments that GrowthWorks Atlantic does, usually over multiple rounds for the larger amounts, Clark is also looking for companies to have a competitive advantage, whether it be intellectual property rights or a certain market share, as well as opportunity to expand nationally or internationally.

The people running the companies Clark is interested in for investments need to have "a track record and knowledge in the industry they're operating in," he says.

The company also looks for investments that can provide a good return over a five-to-eight-year term.

To help ensure that happens Clark takes a hands-on interest in the startups helping them identify potential new markets, employees and directors.

The $35-million Atlantic fund is part of the more than $700 million in assets GrowthWorks WV Management Ltd. manages nationally. This means Clark has a greater pool of talent to draw from to help his New Brunswick companies.

"We're accountable to our shareholders to generate venture capital returns," Clark says explaining why he spends so much time helping the companies his firm invests in. "We have a background in business and helping businesses grow, and using our experience and our network to complement the network the (business) owner has to really accelerate the business."

Mariner Partners receives R&D funding

Rowser — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:48:37 -0400

Author

Reid Southwick

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Friday February 12th, 2010

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http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/rss/article/952136

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‘The number of people using this technology which was created right here in Saint John is growing by tens of thousands every single day,’ says Curtis Howe, president and CEO of Mariner Partners Inc. Photo by: Cindy Wilson/Telegraph-Journal

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Ottawa invests $500,000 in xVu software, which monitors Internet protocol television networks and checks for service problems

Mariner Partners Inc., a technology firm based in Saint John, is working on the second generation of its flagship product that saves telecommunications firms time and money in delivering television service over broadband networks.

The firm received $500,000 from Ottawa for research and development of the next wave of xVu, software that monitors Internet protocol television (IPTV) networks and checks for service problems, company and government officials announced Thursday.

While the first generation allowed teleco providers to test for glitches throughout their systems, the second form will also allow customers to identify problems in their homes by clicking a button.

In other words, Mariner Partners is trying to put the TV repairman out of work.

"With this investment, Mariner Partners will further expand the monitoring and control system of its technology in order to gain higher customer acceptance of this new form of TV delivery," Saint John MP Rodney Weston told reporters, politicians and business officials a the Trade and Convention Centre Thursday.

"As a result of this project, Mariner Partners will expand into lucrative new global markets."

Tens of millions of households across the globe are now subscribing to IPTV, a television service that offers high-quality viewing with enhanced features that allow consumers to record a program in one room and view it in another, for example.

The technology traces its origins back to iMagicTV, a now-defunct Saint John company that was the first in the world to offer software for IPTV. Mariner is now trying to lead the world in ensuring the service is free of fuzziness, pixilation and freezes.

"The number of people using this technology, which was created right here in Saint John, is growing by tens of thousands every single day," said Curtis Howe, president and CEO.

The technology gives service providers a competitive edge in offering a more reliable and higher performance television service, while saving them money in maintenance costs by better equipping them to detect and solve problems.

"(Telecos) are spending a tremendous amount of money in repair activity, and they spend a lot of money hunting for the problem - we help them find the problem," Howe said.

"We started monitoring what was happening in the home, but we weren't able to give it to the consumer in a way that they could understand it until now. If we tell the consumer you have an MPEG continuity count error, they are not too sure what to do with that. But if we say, check this wire and see that it's plugged in, that's totally different."

Mariner serves telecos in Canada, the United States, parts of Europe and Southeast Asia. It has forged partnerships with Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKEX: 4338), Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) and Israeli-based Orca Interactive Ltd. (LSE:ORCA) to maximize its exposure in the market.

"We think that our partnerships with Cisco, Microsoft and Orca are probably going to be critical for us reaching those customers in Europe and in Asia," Howe said.

The firm is actively selling the first generation of its xVu product and is holding demonstrations of its new line as it develops the technology, with funding and technical support from the National Research Council.

The second generation is expected to be ready by the beginning of 2011, though Howe said he wants to have a good chuck of the work finished by the end of this year.

How to change the world with innovation

Rowser — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 14:10:17 -0400

Author

Rebecca Penty

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Saturday December 12th, 2009

Source Url

http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/journal/article/887445

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Guy Kawasaki’s venture capital fund, Garage Technology Ventures, bets on entrepreneurs. ‘It’s really the case where the richest vein is two people working at home part-time building the product they want to use and they have an engineering background,’ he says. Kawasaki will be the keynote speaker at the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation’s R3 Gala on March 18 at the Delta Fredericton.

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It's easier to do business with less money, says Silicon Valley investor Guy Kawasaki

The biggest technology firms in the world are conceived of in the minds of engineers, says California innovation guru Guy Kawasaki.

"Apple, Google, Yahoo, Cisco, those types of companies that change things," said the Silicon Valley investor in high-tech startups.

Google was developed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they were computer science graduate students at Stanford University in the late 1990s, to name one example.

Kawasaki's venture capital fund, Garage Technology Ventures, bets on entrepreneurs with engineering expertise and has one investment in a data-integrity company developed by such thinkers - Tripwire Inc.

"It's really the case where the richest vein is two people working at home part-time building the product they want to use and they have an engineering background," he said in an interview.

Kawasaki will be the keynote speaker at the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation's R3 Gala on March 18 at the Delta Fredericton.

The event - which stands for "recognizing research results-" honours three successful New Brunswick researchers who have produced applied work that impacts the province's industries.

The foundation hopes to attract up to 400 academics and corporate types to help foster partnerships - Kawasaki is meant to bring out the business folks.

Kawasaki said he will talk about how to raise money, make a product, sell it and collect earnings, including 11 steps on "how to change the world with innovation."

"In my travels around the world, innovators and entrepreneurs are more similar than they are different," he said.

Kawasaki is a founding partner of Garage Technology Ventures and the co-founder of Alltop.com, termed an "online magazine rack" of popular topics on the web with news stories associated with those topics. He was an Apple Fellow at Apple Computer Inc.

He is an author of nine books on entrepreneurship and related topics and a public speaker.

His venture firm, which provides seed funding in amounts between $250,000 and $500,000, cut back its investments this year as the markets took a hit, Kawasaki admitted.

According to the U.S. National Venture Capital Association, which cites PricewaterhouseCoopers' compilation of Thomson Reuters data, venture capital investment is down a great deal this year and last.

In the third quarter of 2009, 637 deals across the country worth US$4.8 billion were made, compared with 904 deals worth US$5.7 billion in 2008.

The 2009 figures are worth almost half the value of third quarter investments two years ago: Venture capitalists bet on 1,076 startups and shelled out a total of $8 billion in 2007.

"It's harder than ever to raise money, no question," Kawasaki said.

Luckily, it's easier to do business with less money, he said, advising entrepreneurs to employ social networking sites for marketing, use open source software and pay for cloud storage over hosting data in-house to cut infrastructure expenses.

"I think that people should bootstrap their companies and don't assume they're going to raise venture capital," he said.

Calvin Milbury, president and CEO of the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation, said he hopes Kawasaki will be the drawing card that will "bring out the masses" to the gala next March.

The foundation's premiere research event, the R3 gala fits into the organization's mandate to "spur innovation and help commercialist research," Milbury said.

Last year, researchers recognized were Dr. Marc Surette of the Université de Moncton; Kevin Shiell of the New Brunswick Community College and Tillmann Benfey of the University of New Brunswick. Douglas Campbell and Amanda Cockshutt of Mount Allison University were also commended for commercializing a proprietary phytoplankton testing procedure.

Remaining otherwise tight-lipped, Milbury said the foundation will soon announce funding for a project Shiell is working on.

The Grand Falls-based researcher has worked to turn unusable potatoes into biodegradable plastic through a fermentation process and has moved on recently to transform potatoes, wheat and barley into biogas that can be used to generate electricity.

Accelerator program expanding

Rowser — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:06:43 -0400

Author

John Pollack

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Monday November 16th, 2009

Source Url

http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/rss/article/858379

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Jeff White, vice-president, Corporate Finance Advisory Mergers and Acquisitions at Deloitte and one of Propel's founders, says Propel has hit its stride. Photo by: Cindy Wilson/Telegraph-Journal

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Propel ICT Inc. hopes to support 36 startup companies over the next three years

For a new business it's almost unheard of for everything to go according to plan. So when a startup incubator launched in New Brunswick in early 2007 it was no exception.

But almost three years later, Propel ICT Inc.'s accelerator program - which helps startups learn everything they need to know - is ready to expand drastically, executive director Jeff Roach says.

Three new companies have been accepted into the program - which will launch separately in the coming weeks and months - but perhaps more significantly 10 companies applied for the positions.

"We have almost as much interest from companies wanting to come into the program as we've served," he says. "Our level of activity has just gone through the roof over the last year."

With demand for the program accelerating Propel is expecting to accept 12 companies a year until 2012.

"We're looking at 36 companies supported by Propel in the next three years," he says. "We expect four to eight to be highly successful and to serve as a solid backbone for a strong ICT economy with a wide reputation as an entrepreneurial jurisdiction ripe for investment for the next decade."

So far nine companies have entered the program, two of which ceased operations and one of which graduated. The others are still within the expected two to three year period of the program.

In launching the accelerator program Propel expected to initially take in six startups per year, but the demand wasn't there.

"We were a startup ourselves," says Jeff White, one of the non-profit organization's founders. "We didn't grow as fast as we expected.

"Our own business plan may have been more aggressive than we thought," he says. "We're at a point where a year ago, we were thinking is it needed? Is it wanted?"

But he says the organization has hit its stride - even if it came a couple years later than expected - and expansion is around the corner.

"Based on what we're seeing today those look like achievable targets," he says. "Are they push targets? Absolutely."

To hit these goals Propel is seeking partnerships with any person or organization concerned with expanding the province's technology sector. The group is looking for startups; experienced entrepreneurs, businesspeople and technology experts to act as mentors and financial support.

"I think if we can get more organizations and more people to recognize you can get some benefit out of being involved with this we will succeed," White says. "Small companies grow up to be big companies. What looks like a startup and some might see as a risk, is an opportunity."

Roach says the recently formed New Brunswick IT Council should be a great partner for Propel in reaching their goals.

"There are certain things Propel has done because no one else was doing it and it was necessary," he says, using examples such as discussing tax structure, choosing growth sectors or prioritizing different types of research and development.

Propel's focus has always been to support technology entrepreneurs, but over the years people have approached the group asking to form other committees under the Propel name such as Propel Talent, which focuses on labour force issues.

"Maybe the N.B. IT council can help us grow that and take responsibility for some of that," he says. "Our accelerator will become all we really do eventually."

Roach says Propel has a very engaged network that can also benefit the new council.

"When the N.B. IT council identifies issues we need to address, then they can tap into our network," he says.

KnowCharge Inc. secures additional investment in venture capital

Rowser — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:27:39 -0300

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Daily Gleaner, Published Thursday October 29th, 2009

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http://dailygleaner.canadaeast.com/rss/article/839750

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KnowCharge Inc. has secured an additional investment of $100,000 in venture capital from the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation. The funds will support the commercialization of the company's electrostatic protective and anti-counterfeit paper based products.

KnowCharge won second prize and an investment of $50,000 in the foundation's Breakthru Business Plan Competition earlier this year.

The decision comes after KnowCharge started collaborating with ALX Technical Services Inc., of Concord, Ont., to develop its first static discharging packaging product for use by the electronics industry.

ALX Technical, one of the oldest manufacturers of static control products in North America, serving companies like Celestica, IBM and Honeywell, offers several unique products for the electronics industry.

"Our relationship with ALX actually started the night of the Breakthru Awards last March," says KnowCharge president Robert Morrow, "Ralph Cilevitz, the president of ALX, saw the television story CBC did about us, did the 411 on my name, called my home and got my cellphone number, and then called me - right in the middle of the awards ceremony. Talk about good timing . . . a little serendipity."

From his office at ALX's Concord head offices, Cilevitz said that new and exciting products don't come along very often in the static control industry.

"I've been in this industry for 30 years," says Cilevitz, "KnowCharge is bringing something innovative and exciting which will enable electronic manufacturers to reduce their costs."

The effects of static discharge are estimated to cause about 30 per cent of electronic device failures costing the electronics industry in excess of $100 billion every year, while the costs of product counterfeiting is in the hundreds of billions of dollars globally.

KnowCharge's conductive paper technology, based on research first developed at the University of New Brunswick, and partly funded by the NBIF, provides a sustainable and cost effective means to build static protection or anti-counterfeit capabilities directly into the DNA of paper.

"Getting KnowCharge off the ground is the perfect example of what we do at the foundation, and what we'd like to see more of," says NBIF president Calvin Milbury, "and that's providing equity capital to entrepreneurs that take an interest in the research that we support at the province's universities, and help them get it out into the marketplace."

Innovation Foundation invests in KnowCharge

johnsgunn — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 14:59:21 -0300

Author

John Pollack

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Telegraph-Journal, Published Thursday October 22nd, 2009

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http://nbbusinessjournal.canadaeast.com/journal/article/832096

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Robert Morrow

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Technology: Organization supporting firm which strives to take research that comes out of province and turns it into a viable business

The New Brunswick Innovation Foundation has invested $100,000 in Fredericton-based start-up KnowCharge Inc., the foundation will announce today.

The equity funding will support product development as KnowCharge works toward the first implementation of its unique static-resistant paper technology.

The investment agreement, which closed Tuesday, came after the company struck a deal with Concord, Ont.-based ALX Technical Services Inc. to test the technology in a production setting.

"Hopefully the collaboration agreement will turn into a distribution agreement, which will have a sales component to it," KnowCharge chief executive Robert Morrow said Wednesday.

ALX makes boxes that electronics come in, almost all of which currently have a static-resistant paint put on the box to protect the devices within. Static charges cause 30 per cent of all electronics failures costing the industry approximately $100 billion every year.

KnowCharge's technology, which was developed by University of New Brunswick chemical engineer Yonghao Ni, has static-resistant properties built into the paper product.

"It should be less expensive, easier to produce and it should make me more money," XLS president Ralph Cilevitz said.

The test should be done within two to four months, he said.

On top of being cheaper, it's also recyclable, which other static-protection products aren't.

"Making sure that any package is sustainable and environmentally friendly is important," Morrow said.

For KnowCharge a successful production test will likely mean the company has its crucial first customer, he said.

ALX sells its electronics packaging to many large international companies such as IBM Corp. (NYSE:IBM) and Honeywell International Inc. (NYSE:HON).

"They may not know that it's KnowCharge technology inside that box," Morrow said. "But we'll make sure to build some sort of brand awareness around what ALX does."

Although KnowCharge still has plenty of work ahead of it in commercializing the technology, Morrow said he is happy how well the business is coming along.

"To already have a partner and the potential to be in revenue within a year, it's certainly a testament as to why NBIF invested," Morrow said.

Earlier this year the company also won the silver award in the innovation foundation's Breakthru competition, earning $50,000 and $10,000 in professional services.

Foundation president Calvin Milbury said his organization was interested in KnowCharge because they are striving to take research that came out of New Brunswick and turn it into a viable business.

"This is an example of how new innovative technology can be applied in traditional industries to add value and generate economic wealth," Milbury said. "Our goal would be to help the company get to the point where they have their first commercial sale."

He wouldn't say what percentage of KnowCharge the foundation now owns, only that the non-profit organization is a minority shareholder.

KnowCharge is also pursuing security and anti-counterfeit applications for its technology, Morrow said, with passports being one possible application. The paper is conductive and KnowCharge can control the level of conductivity.

"When it gets scanned, obviously the data base will know that that passport for that person should have these set of characteristics," he said. "It's very easy and cost effective to produce in the paper making process, and it's very costly and difficult to reproduce."

Innovatia executives buy firm from Bell Aliant

Jeff Roach — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 19:07:56 -0300

Author

John Pollack

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Friday October 9th, 2009

Source Url

http://nbbusinessjournal.canadaeast.com/journal/article/818610

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Innovatia Inc.’s Roxanne Fairweather and David Grebenc are buying the company from Bell Aliant. ‘We’ve had a great incubation period with Bell Aliant,’ says Fairweather, Innovatia’s chief operating officer. ‘We are at the point in our business where it makes sense for new ownership and for a new model of driving growth.’

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SAINT JOHN - Innovatia Inc.'s two senior leaders, Roxanne Fairweather and David Grebenc, will have an increased incentive to expand the business come Nov. 1 when they take over as owners.

The parent company, Halifax-based Bell Aliant Regional Communications Income Fund (TSX:BA.UN), announced the sale of the Saint John-based company Thursday.

"We've had a great incubation period with Bell Aliant," said Fairweather, Innovatia's chief operating officer. "We are at the point in our business where it makes sense for new ownership and for a new model of driving growth."

Bell Aliant's predecessor, Aliant Inc., launched Innovatia in 2000 and the next year Fairweather transferred from her post as president of Aliant Wireless to run the new company.

Innovatia provides knowledge management and training services to more than 1,500 companies worldwide.

"Knoweldge management is the management of all key information that is required in an enterprise to support your products, services and processes," Fairweather said. "We do professional services that actually evaluate how you're using your information, how you're using your training and we can develop the right solution for our clients to be more productive."

Innovatia works with many Fortune 500 companies and Fairweather said developing those relationships will be a key focus under the new ownership.

Fairweather and Grebenc, the director of sales, marketing and finance, plan to keep all 300 employees, 200 of which are based in New Brunswick, while the rest are spread throughout Atlantic Canada, Ontario, the United States and India.

In November Grebenc will become the chief operating officer and Fairweather will be president and chief executive.

Although Fairweather said the company is profitable, Bell Aliant spokeswoman Alyson Queen said executives from both companies decided it was the right time to transfer ownership.

"Innovatia is a unique, specialized business that is very different from the rest of Bell Aliant," Queen said.

Mike Mills, an analyst for Halifax-based Beacon Securities Ltd. that follows Bell Aliant, said the sale isn't a significant change to the publicly traded company.

"Something like this wouldn't change my earnings estimates," he said. "It's so small that it really doesn't move the needle one way or the other."

If the company were to sell a subsidiary such as Xwave, which on average makes up slightly less than 10 per cent of Bell Aliant's overall revenue, it would be a different story, Mills said. But he said over the last 12 months Innovatia's revenues were about $23 million, or less than one per cent of Bell Aliant's more than $3 billion in annual revenue.

Neither Bell Aliant nor Innovatia would disclose the price tag of the deal, but it will be revealed in the telco's third quarter results due for release Nov. 10. Fairweather said the negotiations, which she described as "cordial," took place over the preceding few months.

Fairweather and Grebenc will be equal owners and don't have any other investors, but she wouldn't say how they raised the money to buy the business.

"It's something that David and I were obviously able to accomplish," she responded. "We're very, very excited about this and very confident."

Grebenc, who started at Innovatia five years ago, and Fairweather both have more than 20 years experience in business.

Jeff Roach, executive director of technology association PropelICT Inc., described the ownership change as an indicator of the company's potential.

"It should be a vote of confidence that the people that are closest to the company have decided to put their own investment into it," he said.

Richard Jones, president of Propel, and former Maritime director for Xwave, said both are "top notch businesspeople and entrepreneurs."

"I know Dave and Roxanne are going to be very focused on growth," he said. "In my experience of working with them they've been very consistent in terms of promoting the message of 'We're going to build something here in New Brunswick and be able to sell products and services all over the world.' "

Power lies in a polished management team

Rowser — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 10:22:54 -0300

Author

Dave MacLean

Source

Telegraph-Journal, Published Tuesday October 6th, 2009

Source Url

http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/rss/article/814641

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‘Hire people on your senior team who are much better than you are in their respective skills,’ says Jack Derby. Photo by Ray Bourgeois for The Daily Gleaner

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Boston-based investor spending two days with entrepreneurs in Fredericton, writing business plans to attract outside risk capital

The key to securing venture capital is to build a solid management team, says a Boston-based investor who has helped companies secure more than $645 million over the past two decades.

Jack Derby, president of Derby Management, has been helping New Brunswick firms gain access into the lucrative New England venture capital market the past few years. This week, he's in Fredericton as part of the second annual CBDC Exchange Venture Capital Boot Camp which has attracted representatives from about 20 New Brunswick companies.

Derby says entrepreneurs should surround themselves with the best management team they can find, then come up with a solid, but flexible business plan.

"You have to ask 'Do I have the best senior managers around me?'," Derby said Monday during a break at the Fredericton conference. "Hire people on your senior team who are much better than you are in their respective skills.

"If I'm an entrepreneur with an ability to engineer great products, I've got to get great salespeople, great marketing people, great finance people, great development people."

Then, it's important to come up with a plan - one that should be revisited often and tweaked when necessary.

"We're spending a lot of time over these two and a half days talking to these entrepreneurs about writing business plans to attract outside risk capital," Derby said. "But you have to remember to keep that business plan flexible.

"There's a lot of money out there. There's less than before and the bar has been raised on that money. If you think you're going to go in with an idea on the back of an envelope, it just isn't going to work.

"You have to have a honed business plan and a polished management team in place."

Last year, a number of entrepreneurs visited Derby and other investment experts in Boston. This year, the experts have travelled north, which helps the New Brunswick companies save time and money.

John Bowles, the co-owner, co-founder and vice-president of Fredericton-based Inversa Systems Ltd. says his company is hoping to raise capital in the United States and this week's conference has been providing valuable information.

"We've been through the mill raising money - everything from grants to debt financing and various ways of equity financing through private investors and venture capitalists," Bowles said. "We've stayed in Canada with all of our investments to date, which has been fairly friendly. But the volume of choice in who your investors are isn't the same as in the U.S.

"One of the things you really want with any money that you raise is not just any money - you want it to be smart money. Somebody who has contacts or who can open doors to industry or to a new client. We're looking at raising venture capital in the U.S. The barrier for Maritime-based companies is that we don't have a lot of contacts down there."

And it can be very expensive to make those contacts, Bowles said. Consultants who help arrange meetings with investors don't come cheap - starting at about $5,000 a day on the low end. Having Derby and others come to Fredericton will save Inversa thousands of dollars in up-front money and Bowles will be better prepared when he ventures south of the border.

"This could be saving us somewhere in the $30,000 range," he said. "We're also picking their brains. For the next two and a half days, we're trying to find out what the U.S. markets are looking for and how to go about approaching that market.

"The more we can do in advance of going down there, the more time and money we save and we also increase our chances of getting the money."

Bowles, whose company is developing cutting-edge industrial imaging that has been compared to CT scans for machinery and infrastructure, says this week's conference will help Inversa officials be better prepared when they go knocking on the doors of potential investors.

"There are strategic differences between the Canadian and U.S. markets and you need to be aware of them and you need to tailor your plan for that," he said. "You can make yourself attractive by tailoring your business plan to appeal to a certain type of audience and these consultants can help us do that - they deal with it every day."

TONIGHT: propel Director and Mentor, Dan Martell, to Keynote Rising Stars Gala

Jeff Roach — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:54:37 -0300

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Rising Stars Committee

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http://propelict.com/node/1791

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Dan Martell, 2009 Rising Stars Keynote Speaker

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Tickets still available - details below

An award winning Entrepreneur, Dan recently co-founded Flowtown, a company focused on providing web-based tools that allow small businesses to measure their online marketing efforts. Now living in San Francisco, Martell spends the majority of his time looking at ways to build a bridge between Silicon Valley and New Brunswick. As an informal angel investor, he is active in advising entrepreneurs using metric-based marketing tactics to gain market adoption.

Cost:
$75.00 per person. Tickets available at the door. Details at www.risingstars.ca

The Best 54Hours of the Season Start Friday in Moncton!

Rowser — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 09:32:05 -0300

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propel Accelerator is pumped to be involved with 54Hours Startup Weekend!

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Started Friday October 2 and running through to Sunday, New Brunswick's entrepreneurs, developers, and designers will gather together to share ideas and start businesses at the Crowne Plaza hotel in downtown Moncton. Similar to other startup weekends that have been held in cities across North America, the 54Hours event seeks to take business ideas from concept to launch in just one weekend.

Participants begin by bringing pitch ideas to the table on Friday evening, and the best of those ideas will be accepted by working teams. The goal is to divide into teams on Friday evening, and bring the ideas to market by the following Monday morning. “The entire weekend is meant to be a fun way for members of the ICT and business community to interact and network with one another at a deeper level than is generally possible at a traditional industry event,” says Craig Gallant, an ICT project manager based in Moncton who is one of the organizers. “54 Hours is designed to be a lot of fun, however will hopefully also result in the creation of several web-based enterprises that will enrich New Brunswick's ICT environment”.

There is no cost to attend the event and the only requirement is a little skill, a positive attitude and a willingness to roll with the punches. The atmosphere is meant to be fun and the entire process organic. “We’ve adopted the slogan 'No Talk. All Action.' for the event and we are intentionally keeping the agenda loosely defined,” explains Gallant. “We want to the weekend to be like the early days of a startup, where creativity and frenetic energy are the norm and there aren’t a lot of rules.”

So what happens when the weekend is over? Above all, it is hoped that a strong community bond will form but beyond that, it depends on the group. Some groups work beyond the weekend and continue to build and market their products; some may incorporate as companies and even engage in angel rounds. Issues like ownership and shares are determined by the members of a team over the course of the weekend and 54Hours will not retain any ownership of any company that might be formed over the course of the event.

"We strongly support these grassroots, creative activities that help people visualize what their ideas might look like in the shape of a business." says Jeff Roach of propel ICT, a private, nonprofit, Information and Communications Technology (ICT) association based in New Brunswick.

"There are plenty of good ideas out there, but it takes more than an idea to give a business its legs. This is an opportunity to assemble business managers, startup enthusiasts, developers, designers and marketers in one place to see if natural partnerships will form. We are extremely interested to see what might come from this weekend."

To participate in this fun, unique networking event, please visit www.54Hours.com and sign up.

Matt Doherty, a participant from a recent 54hours weekend held in Saint John, NB, summed it up this way: “…54hours was an experience akin to throwing a handful of seeds in a garden and seeing what grew. To have such a talented cross-section of people come together and create three businesses with actual opportunities is such a great outcome. Everyone who attended brought something different and being surrounded by these people showed me how myopic we can become in our day to day life. It was refreshing to be able to learn from and to interact with such a varied group. If I had to pick one word to describe the weekend, it would be 'intense'”.

Media Contacts:
Heather Spencer
Emerging & Social Media Specialist, HAWK
spencer.heather@hawk.ca
506.877.1485

Michael Wilcott
Xentient Solutions Inc.
mwilcott@xentientsolutions.com
506.647.3269