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And The Victor Winners Are
Early Stage Angel and Seed Investment CategoryThe finalists are Savvica, Virtual Reach, and Demand Cast. The winner is DemandCast. Venture Capital Category The finalists are EQO, iSequent, and Truition. The winner is Truition. Public Venture Capital Category The finalists are Official Community, Access Anywhere, and Pyxis. The winner is Official Community.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/13
Virtual Expert Clinic’s CEO Pitches The Company
Virtual Expert Clinics - Cynthia Howroyd CEO If ever there was a company that deserves to do well it is Virtual Expert Clinics. VEC offers online expert resources to service any number of health related needs. Their first project targets the growing phenomenon of autistic children. There are 1.2 million autistic children in the world. An additional 15% more kids are diagnosed with autism every year. Take ten minutes and listen to Cynthia's presentation.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/12
Day 2, Some Early Stage Companies Looking for Funding - 2
This compilation video is from the afternoon's group 3 presentations. These entrepreneurs know their companies and products.This group proved to be exceptionally strong so we are going to include a video compilation of their presentation. That will be posted in an about an hour. Here is a quick text summary of their presentations: The session's presenters are Software Innovation, Zeligsoft, Softchaos, and Quazal Technologies. Reza Farhad, CEO & Founder - Softchaos of Montreal Their product, Webstractor (Radar), allows users to capture web pages as they browse: Gather-manage-use web information. The product is used in education and research. Webstractor won a MacWorld Eddie. They have already received favourable press and awards. How does it work? The Webstractor tool allow web users to save web pages they have collected. More than that, once saved, the pages become editable. The tool allows users to extract web data from existing pages and reuse it. it works in tandem with Microsoft Word. Softchaos anticipates $45 Million in sales by 2009. Markets include education, consumers, and institutions and they expect to sell three-million units. The unit cost of Webstractor is $99 CAD. The people at gagglescape - and many people in the media business - have always wanted a tool like this. Congratulations to Softchaos for this product. Coreworx Project Collaboration - Randal Howard - Former Software Innovation CEO. Coreworx is a project collaboration platform servicing the trillion - yes trillion - dollar megaproject industry. it is scalable, web-based enterprise solution. It now has 25,000 users. They sell to large projects only. There are 1200 companies in that market. Think Bechtel size here. The average sale is anywhere from $2 - 8 Million for a full enterprise rollout. They have generated about $5 Mil so far. The sell is to "C" level management. What does it (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/12
Day 2, Linda Hohol of the TSX Answers Audience Questions
Linda Hohol, President of the TSX Venture Exchange gave the keynote speech this morning. In this clip she answers questions from the audience. Please note that the quality is low - this was shot on a cell phone then transferred via Bluetooth to the net.Here are some highlights from Hohol's talk: What does the TSX Venture Exchange offer to the venture market? Their CPC program is a unique investment vehicle that is becoming more popular. CPC allows the financing group to invest money AND operational experience in a company. This allows new ways to get early stage investment into the market. 35% of graduates to the TVX have come through the program. Limit on the pool is $2 Million. See Kangaroo Technologies as an example. Founded in 2001. TSX VG is unique - they are accessing the "nanocap space." Their regulatory standards are lighter than the TSX or even AIM's. See web site TSX.com for listing requirements. The TSX Venture Group is attracting strong institutional interest. What was Hohol's key message? Canada needs to produce more entrepreneurs because the more churn there is in the market the more experience the entrepreneurship community will obtain. The result will be a stronger technology base for the country.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/12
Day 2, Some Early Stage Companies Looking for Funding
 This morning's first presenters include Virtual Reach Inc., Alltigo, Mercuri Teleconferencing, and Diginiche. The two we will focus on is this group are Alltigo and Virtual Reach. Jay Steel -CTO-Virtual Reach Co-founders of Plazmic in Mississauga, a company with success in China. Former employee of RIM. They have launched a new product that offers a newsclip service for mobile devices like the BlackBerry. The back-end technology uses RSS feeds. It is an easier platform for companies to develop on than WAP and JAVA. Why RSS? RSS is popular, simple, and functional. Industry leaders have embraced and validated the RSS technology. They sell into wholesale and retail channels. First customer which launched this week is Rogers Wireless. Their market is very large because of the number of mobile devices that are communications ready. For example, there are 40,000 BlackBerry Enterprise Servers now serving 5 Million RIM devices. They are looking for $2.5 million in capital to continue to expand their product line. Company 2 - Alltigo - Nenad Lazovic, Director of Engineering - Mobile Tracking Devices Alltigo builds automotive telematics and personal telematics technologies. It is a big market: $5.6 Billion and rapidly growing. What are the applications? Their products can be used to prevent vehicle theft, reduce transportation costs, aid personal security, and in law enforcement. The existing technology that drives this market needs to be replaced. Alltigo's technology is low-cost and powerful. It is comprised of mobile positioning hardware, a software platform, and integration services. The mobile device that would be placed on a truck, for example, resembles a small cell phone. It is very compact. The tech works on Adaptive Assisted GPS. It is TCP/IP device. The company's revenue streams are: Device sales, Tech licenses, systems integration, and maintenance. R&D is complete. Order of 500 in the works. 45 (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/12
Day 2, Canadian Venture Forum
Day 2 of the Canadian Venture Forum begins. We will have some video highlights today so stay tuned. This afternoon at 3:30 the winners of this year's Victor Awards will be announced. Someone also promised a Single Malt tasting - we look forward to the day's events.The keynote speaker this morning is Linda Hohol, President of the TSX Venture Exchange. Come back for ongoing reports as the day unfolds.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/12
The People Behind The Canadian Venture Forum
 Photo by Stephanie Lake.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/11
Day 1, Some Early Stage Companies Looking for Funding - 2
 The second session in today's early stage Angel and Seed group includes Clay Tablet, Savvica, Medshare, and Accuvision. The two companies we will follow this afternoon are Clay Tablet and Savvica. Clay Tablet's Federated Translation Platform - CEO Robinson Kelly From the earliest days of recorded history we've used translation services to reduce the barriers between people and cultures. That is Clay Tablet's strength. The company provides efficient tools to manage the flow of text from a client to translation services and back again. They are seeking $2 to 3 Million in first round investment. The five fastest growing languages requiring translation services are: Russian, Portuguese, Chinese, French, and English. Manually managing the text translation process is difficult and time consuming. Although Kelly does not specify how much it costs a Fortune 1000 company to manage its translation activities, the costs are laden with inefficiencies and man-hours that are not tracked. Even in-house translation services can benefit from the technology. Their work flow analysis illustrates how effective the Clay Tablet solution is (was it done by x-plane?). While not sexy from a Web 2.0 perspective, Clay Tablet provides a strong solution that services a real market need. Their market projections are good if not somewhat modest in that Canadian start-up kind of way.  Savvica - CEO Mark Sterling - e-learning product is "nuvvo." One of the great benefits of the Internet is in its ability to facilitate learning. There are a number of enterprise level e-learning systems on the market but how do small businesses and individuals access e-learning technology? The answer is Savvica's "nuvvo." It, according to CEO Mark Sterling, does to e-learning what blogs have done to publishing by making the tools easy to use. With nuvvo an instructor can almost instantaneously get a learning solution online. Payment is (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/11
Day 1, Some Early Stage Companies Looking for Funding
The companies presenting in this morning's group are Trustifi, Sprylogics, D2V Technologies, and Intelletto. We'll look at two of them: Trustifi and Sprylogics.Peter Bennesty - CEO of Trustifi - client centric identity solution - Anti-Identity Theft specialists. Peter was a victim of identity theft in 2001 and that convinced him to enter the business. They are a "Specialized Identity Provider." It gives people control over who gets access to critical identity information. The market is huge. $1.2 Billion on 005 to $8.5 in 2010. Trustifi's market is 120 mil by 2010. Because Internet relationships are inherently based on trust - I believe you are who you tell me you are - there is room for fraud. Trustifi's service gives, say, dating services, the ability to build trust relationships based on accurate info. Controlling user credentials is a key success factor. Their revenue model is that each end-user pays $18-40 - per year for the services. If a dating service has one-million users and ten to fifteen percent choose to use the verification service then, well, you do the math. Trustifi is looking for $2 million in "A" round funding. SpyLogics - CEO Avi Shachar - Former Senior Intel Analyst, Ontario Securities Commission. Their product lets the financial services industries do risk analysis on potential partners, etc., to prevent scams, securities fraud. Board of Advisors includes Ben Soave, the former Commisioner of the RCMP's white-collar crime division. Great list of current and future partners. Their technology is predictive with a "unique social network analysis capability." Presenters are serious players in the market integrity and risk mitigation marketplace. The founders are ex-Israeli intelligence officers. The market for their services is significant. World-wide more than 100 Billion dollars as regulatory groups try more and more to prevent investor fraud. Both these companies are (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/11
Day 1, The Facts Behind Canada’s VC Performance by Mary MacDonald
 Mary MacDonald of Thomson Financial provided the deligates and investors with a remarkably concise overview of the Canadian VC environment. Here are the facts, just the facts: - The market has been flat since '02. There are no signs that the CDN market is improving, in fact, the money available for VC financing is tightening up.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/11
Day 1, the Toronto Venture Group Venture Forum: Let the Games Begin!
.jpg) A candidate company readies their booth prior to the opening of today's Venture Forum Post Number One There is a buzz around this conference. At last night's official launch party Rick Nathan spoke eloquently about the need for Canadian investors to step up their early-stage investments. His message? there are good opportunities out there and if we don't take advantage of them US investors will and Canada will lose a generation of its top innovators. How does the Forum work? Candidate companies pitch their value propositions and business plans to a jury of reviewers. At the end of the conference there is a vote and the winners are announced. What are the categories? 1. VC-Ready and VC-Backed 2. VC-Ready and VC-Backed 3. Angel and Seed Winners are selected Friday at 3:30 (and we're told there is a Scotch tasting as well - another good reason for entrepreneurs and investors to come to this conference).
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/11
TVG’s Canadian Venture Forum
 The Toronto Venture Forum is the premier Canadian showcase for early stage companies looking for venture financing. This year's forum promises to be one of the most lively ever. For an event schedule please go to the Toronto Venture Group web site. Gagglescape will be covering the conference live updating the site throughout the day tomorrow and Friday. Drop by the site to find out what's attracting the most interest. What company will be the hottest investment prospect?
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/10
Hard Startup Lessons
Paul Graham has some good advice for startups. His seven lessons are:1. Release Early. The thing I probably repeat most is this recipe for a startup: get a version 1 out fast, then improve it based on users' reactions. 2. Keep Pumping Out Features. Of course, "release early" has a second component, without which it would be bad advice. If you're going to start with something that doesn't do much, you better improve it fast. 3. Make Users Happy. Improving constantly is an instance of a more general rule: make users happy. One thing all startups have in common is that they can't force anyone to do anything. They can't force anyone to use their software, and they can't force anyone to do deals with them. A startup has to sing for its supper. That's why the successful ones make great things. They have to, or die. 4. Fear the Right Things. Another thing I find myself saying a lot is "don't worry." Actually, it's more often "don't worry about this; worry about that instead." Startups are right to be paranoid, but they sometimes fear the wrong things. 5. Commitment Is a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy. I now have enough experience with startups to be able to say what the most important quality is in a startup founder, and it's not what you might think. The most important quality in a startup founder is determination. Not intelligence-- determination. 6. There Is Always Room. I was talking recently to a startup founder about whether it might be good to add a social component to their software. He said he didn't think so, because the whole social thing was tapped out. Really? So in a hundred years the only social networking sites will be the Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, and Del.icio.us? Not likely. 7. Don't (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/09
Accessing the Global Brain
 The Internet changes the way companies connect with their customers. When the Cluetrain Manifesto hit the Web 1.0 in the 90's, many businesses said that they would never let customers have access to their manufacturing floor. Guess what - they've changed their tune. Smart CEOs are realizing something that designers have always known: customers know what they want. The result of this trend is that smart Internet developers will create new tools to facilitate the dialogue. Trendwatching's May 2006 newsletter follows the trend described as "customer-made." What is a customer-made product? “The phenomenon of corporations creating goods, services and experiences in close cooperation with experienced and creative consumers, tapping into their intellectual capital, and in exchange giving them a direct say in (and rewarding them for) what actually gets produced, manufactured, developed, designed, serviced, or processed.”  
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/08
Finding Venture Capital
TheStreet.com and Entrepreneur.com have a story titled, "Landing Venture Capital."Last year, out of approximately 125,000 interested parties, just 2,939 "lucky winners" (that's just about 2.4%) split a venture capital pot of $21.7 billion. Let me do the math for you -- each company reeled in about $7.4 million each. And that's how the venture capital community divided out the spoils last year to the very few companies they found to be "worthy." Do you want to find out how to land that VC? Read more here...
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/04
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Local News
The Ontario government is doing something truly unique and laudable says John Albright of JLA Ventures. Last week Ontario's Ministry of Research and Innovation announced a new $205-million fund to help stimulate the province's early-stage ventures.
According to a University of Laval Professor, Canada's Labour Sponsor Funds kill innovation rather than create it. Read the press release here. MediaScrape lands new venture round of $3.2 million. Chris Dingle has been appointed President and Chief Technology Officer. Mr. Dingle was the founding CTO of 24/7 Real Media which sold recently to WPP for $637 million. University Technologies International (UTI) - IGNITE - announces the closing of two first-round financings for two IGNITE companies, Profero Energy Inc. and Circle Cardiovascular Imaging Inc. Kleer Inc. based in California but with a plant in Ottawa landed a $28 million round for its wireless audio product development. The Ottawa Citizen ran this story a few days ago. We've been saying this for years now. When will the public sector make it easier for investment in the province's tech sector? Rick Nathan of the Canadian Venture Capital Association has an optimistic view of the current credit crunch. MSBi Capital announces the addition of two new partners François Gauvin and John Elton. Celtic House Venture Partners of K-W invested in Dublin-based RedMere last week. Rogers Media and CTVglobemedia Inc. announce that Rogers Broadcasting will acquire certain Canadian conventional and specialty television services from CTVglobemedia Inc.
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