Startup Studio - Accelerator & Venture Fund

It was wonderful to spend time with #Calgary founders and tech ecosystem leaders last week🚀🇨🇦🎉 Gratitude to Innovate Calgary for the kind invite! Thank you Puneet Mannan, Haley Jabusch, Alicia Couto, Kevin Dahl, Shannon Stahl, Nima Najand, Nikhil Bedi, Megan Geyer 🙏🎖️ Very much enjoyed insightful conversations with Pej Ghanipour, Craig Elias, Douglas Holt, Oba Harding, Crystal Larm, Ian Gates, PhD, PEng, FCAE, Karen Hamberg, Roman Dubczak, Justin Riemer, Bill Whitelaw and others. Session summary here >> https://lnkd.in/gJ5wSh2b Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders #LinkedInTopStartups #VentureCapital #StartupLife

NEXT WEEK! Very much looking forward to seeing everyone in #Calgary 🚀🇨🇦🎉 Gratitude to Innovate Calgary for the kind invite! Thank you Puneet Mannan, Haley Jabusch, Alicia Couto, Kevin Dahl, Shannon Stahl, Nima Najand, Peter Santosham, Nikhil Bedi, Megan Geyer 🙏🎖️ Link to register >> https://lnkd.in/gBnSKRP3 This seminar is ideal for early-stage founders (pre-seed to pre-series-A) looking to scale their startups and secure investment. Can you please kindly let founders in your networks know? 🎈Carla Otto, Lindsay Spadavecchia, Pej Ghanipour, Lan (Scaleup) Tan, Douglas Holt, Ayo Aiyeleye, MSc, PMP®(Alberta Innovates) 🏆🙏 🎈Oba Harding (Prairies Economic Development Canada I Développement économique Canada pour les Prairies) 🇨🇦🙏 🎈Heather Marshall, MBA, Mark Lowen, Anup Srivastava, Kari Gordon, Terry Cho (Creative Destruction Lab Rockies) 🙏🎊 🎈Terry Rock, Jennifer Lussier, Karam-Ali Talakshi (Platform Calgary) 🙏🎉 🎈Crystal Larm (Global Affairs Canada | Affaires mondiales Canada) 🇨🇦🙏 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders #LinkedInTopStartups #VentureCapital #StartupLife

It was a blast to speak to Alexander Vaselek on The Scale Podcast!   Full episode here >> https://lnkd.in/gX_VtV9J Some of the things we discussed: 02:33 Survival of the fittest - AI Goliaths & Davids 🐘🐣 07:01 How much AI is too much AI? 🤖👩🏭 08:24 Derisking investing in a risky climate 🥅💰 11:58 Best way to get investor feedback 🎯📢 15:21 The smell of trust 👃💡 16:36 Do you punch back? 🥊🕊️ 23:22 Power of human connection ✋🍩   Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders cc: CIMEDO GmbH, Startup Studio - Accelerator & Venture Fund #LinkedInTopStartups #VentureCapital #StartupLife

Looking forward to seeing everyone in #Edmonton on October 16th! 🚀🇨🇦🎉 Gratitude to Edmonton Unlimited for the kind invite! Thank you Tom Viinikka, Ken Bautista, Victoria Celi Jaramillo, Mina M., Eugenio C., Seanna Baxter, Sangeet Brar, CPA, CA, Stephanie Gillis-Paulgaard (she/her) 🙏🎖️ Link to register >> https://lu.ma/yyb2kq68 This seminar is ideal for early-stage founders (pre-seed to pre-series-A) looking to scale their startups and secure investment. Can you please kindly let founders in your networks know? 🎈Carla Otto, Lindsay Spadavecchia, Mike Riou, Lan (Scaleup) Tan, Douglas Holt, Ayo Aiyeleye, MSc, PMP® (Alberta Innovates) 🏆🙏 🎈Oba Harding (Prairies Economic Development Canada I Développement économique Canada pour les Prairies) 🇨🇦🙏 🎈Heather Marshall, MBA, Mark Lowen, Anup Srivastava, Kari Gordon, Terry Cho (Creative Destruction Lab Rockies) 🙏🎊 🎈Darren Fast, David Chang (University of Alberta)🙏🎉 🎈Malcolm Bruce MSM, ICD.D, Brent Jensen 簡瑞昌, Jeff Bell, Franziska Middrup, Almas Danish (Edmonton Global) 🌍 🙏 🎈Crystal Larm (Global Affairs Canada | Affaires mondiales Canada) 🇨🇦🙏 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders

Looking forward to seeing everyone in #Calgary on October 9th! 🚀🇨🇦🎉 Gratitude to Innovate Calgary for the kind invite! Thank you Puneet Mannan, Haley Jabusch, Alicia Couto, Kevin Dahl, Shannon Stahl, Nima Najand, Peter Santosham, Nikhil Bedi, Megan Geyer 🙏🎖️ Link to register >> https://lnkd.in/gBnSKRP3 This seminar is ideal for early-stage founders (pre-seed to pre-series-A) looking to scale their startups and secure investment. Can you please kindly let founders in your networks know? 🎈Carla Otto, Lindsay Spadavecchia, Pej Ghanipour, Lan (Scaleup) Tan, Douglas Holt, Ayo Aiyeleye, MSc, PMP® (Alberta Innovates) 🏆🙏 🎈Oba Harding (Prairies Economic Development Canada I Développement économique Canada pour les Prairies) 🇨🇦🙏 🎈Heather Marshall, MBA, Mark Lowen, Anup Srivastava, Kari Gordon, Terry Cho (Creative Destruction Lab Rockies) 🙏🎊 🎈Terry Rock, Jennifer Lussier, Karam-Ali Talakshi (Platform Calgary)🙏🎉 🎈Crystal Larm (Global Affairs Canada | Affaires mondiales Canada) 🇨🇦🙏 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders

It was an absolute joy to speak to Michael Lints on The Scale Podcast!   Full episode here >> https://lnkd.in/gbasRNNm Some of the things we discussed: 04:34 Product technology driven vs. business model innovation startups 🪆🔆 11:11 What will change our world more - AI or Ozempic 🤖💊 13:39 Sticking to investment thesis vs. following market trends 📚📈 15:50 Importance of having a investment thesis 🌎🏋️♂️ 17:11 Founder X factor – does it matter 👼🪬 18:20 Founder as a magnet 🧲 🧭 22:32 Investability of solo founders vs. teams 💰👫 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders cc: Golden Gate Ventures, Startup Studio - Accelerator & Venture Fund

It was a blast to speak to Jason Smith on The Scale Podcast! Full episode here >> https://lnkd.in/gX_VtV9J Some of the things we discussed: 2:10 How to decide what to build ❓🌎 6:08 That fine line between bullish and bullshit 🐃 🐂 8:16 Lightening strikes vs. the great grind ⚡️🐢 10:32 Can I iterate with you? 🎟️🎭 14:18 Founder conviction – the master key 🔑🧵                             16:54 Two paths to raising a 100 million dollar round 🥷🚴 18:55 Key ingredient of a successful VC conversation - many dots to make a line 🧶🎯 21:58 Only the paranoid survive 🦠🦕 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders 🦄🚀🇨🇦 cc: Klue, Startup Studio - Accelerator & Venture Fund

What makes founders fundable? 🐪💰🦄 via Collision Toronto Video courtesy Kim Bowie

It was an absolute pleasure to speak to Boris Wertz on The Scale Podcast! Full episode here >> https://lnkd.in/gX_VtV9J Some of the things we discussed: 02:44 Opportunity cost of chasing the wrong idea for too long ⏰⌛️ 07:50 Moving fast and breaking things but being mindful of one-way doors 🍷🚪 10:10 Pivot or not to pivot 📌🐢 16:08 How to pick a good team/founder to invest in 🥷👑 18:05 AI game – why incumbents rule 🧶🪢 24:47 What makes a winning founder 🏆🎯 30:54 How many co-founders is too many co-founders 👫🔐 Scale Up Canada (scaleupcanada.org) is not-for-profit public-private partnership connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global deployment of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders 🦄🚀🇨🇦    cc: Version One Ventures, Startup Studio - Accelerator & Venture Fund

Collision Conf last week was an absolute blast! It was fun to join speaker lineup for panel 'What founders need from their first investor' with Liza Benson (Moderne Ventures), Karl Alomar (M13), and our wonderful moderator Alisa Cohn🚀🎖 💰 Very much enjoyed hosting an investor round-table on ''Winning traits of early stage founders', and judging the PITCH semi-finals on Center Stage with Rashmi Gopinath, Wesley Chan, Jenny Fielding, David Meltzer, Ben Daniels, Devin Ramphal, Mobolaji Sokunbi. Hosted by the incomparable Casey Lau Met with many wonderful people for great insights, fantastic conversations and start of wonderful friendships. A few highlights: 🏀 Metta World Peace - very insightful conversation on sports, life, investing and shared golden principles of all 🌍 Alexander Vaselek - exciting discussion on tech ecosystems around the world 🌄 Simon Baptiste - what smaller ecosystems like Canada and West-Indies have in common and what we can learn from each other 📍Daniel Seo - being Canadian and citizen of the world ✨Tod Plotkin - marketing, biz dev and how it all comes together 🇨🇦 Harry Singh - shared love for Canada and all things Canadian 🌶Rashmi Gopinath - great discussion on India, Indians and mutual friends 🎯Paul Michaud - brilliant discussion on building tech companies 🏺Ralph Christian Delos Santos, PhD - golden spoons, white powders (sugar alternative people, Ralph invented it) ⚡Shingai Manjengwa - necessary (evils of) blockchain 💊 Jon Krohn - serious podcasting hacks 💢Mehrdad Hariri - great discussion on empowering the Canadian tech ecosystem 🍄Mike Sigal - very insightful discussion on work, life, and guacamole 🗺Rachel Ash - wonderful conversation on the greater philosophy of giving back Thank you all for your generosity and sharing the knowledge! It was a very well organized event, and many thanks to the good people of Collision for making it all possible Naomi Agnew, Catarina da Silva Ferreira, Rob Reid, Matt Stapleton and others 🥇 🙏 See you all at the Web Summit Vancouver 2025!! 🦄🚀🇨🇦