All Posts Tagged With: "Startups"
Nova Scotia student startup gets $1.1-million investment
LeadSift is evidence of hot Atlantic tech sector
LeadSift's team including Das and Chatterjee
The student founders of LeadSift, a company whose software combs through Twitter and Facebook data to generate sales leads, set out last fall in search of $500,000 of investor cash.
It was an easier than expected hunt.
The Halifax startup pulled in $1.13 million, including $500,000 from OMERS Ventures (the venture capital arm of OMERS, one of Canada’s largest pension funds), as well as a contribution from Dan Martell—Canada’s 2012 angel investor of the year, according to KPMG and Techvibes.
The LeadSift foursome, international students from Dalhousie University and Acadia University, could have raised more money, but decided to cap their fundraising round and ultimately turned away some interested investors.
Continue reading Nova Scotia student startup gets $1.1-million investment
Three Canadian cities on Top 20 Startup Ecosystems list
Two are in Ontario
Startup Genome has released a global ranking of Startup Ecosystems and three of the top 20 entrepreneurial cities are in Canada. The ranking is based on eight components: startup output, funding, company performance, talent, support infrastructure, entrepreneurial mindset, trendsetting tendencies and ecosystem differentiation. Toronto is eighth, Vancouver is ninth and Waterloo, Ont.—the only small city on the list—punches above its weight class at 17th. Here are the top 10:
Continue reading Three Canadian cities on Top 20 Startup Ecosystems list
Hacker hostels emerge in Silicon Valley
Will they catch on in Canada?
Photo by William Brawley
Silicon Valley entrepreneurs have launched a new type of social network. But instead of code, these start-up ventures are built in bricks and mortar.
The New York Times reported Friday on these so-called “hacker hostels.” Here they describe the home of 23-year-old Steve El-Hage from Toronto:
It’s one of several in the Bay Area that offer short- or long-term stays for aspiring tech entrepreneurs on the bottom rung of the Silicon Valley ladder, those who haven’t yet achieved Facebook-level riches. These establishments put a twist on the long tradition of communal housing for tech types by turning it into a commercial enterprise.
Want to work for a startup?
Grads will be paid to work in poor cities
A new non-profit organization called Venture for America will give bright university graduates a crash course in entrepreneurship — if they’re willing to move to a town with a struggling economy.
The idea is to help graduates learn about entrepreneurship, while helping impoverished cities like New Orleans, Providence, R.I., and Detroit to get back on their feet.
After all, business graduates don’t usually move to such economically depressed areas. In that sense, Venture for America is modeled after Teach for America, the highly-successful organization that pays new teachers to move to places where they wouldn’t otherwise move, helping to fight poverty.
VFA will pay its fellows a modest salary of $32,000 to $38,000 per year for two years.
Photo courtesy of Birmingham City University
The startups will get free workers. The workers will get to see a company grow from the ground up.
“These fellows are going to end up in the midst of a really exciting ecosystem and they’re all going to have access to all the entrepreneurs in the region,” Andrew Yang, founder and president, told Fast Company. Some graduates will find success in their new towns and stay permanently, he said.
And one of those grads will get $100,000 at the end of two years to start a business of their own.
But competition is tough. Yang expects 5,000 applicants for the first 50 placements in September.
