Canadian start-up culture

UTEST cited among Toronto’s top 10 tech accelerators

November 9, 2015
Susanne Staer
Awards

UTEST, the tech accelerator co-directed by MaRS Innovation and the University of Toronto, was named to BlogTO‘s Top 10 list of technology accelerators on November 8, 2015.

The list was published just weeks before the announcement of the fourth UTEST cohort, and included recognition of TrendMD and Whirlscape as notable startups among the graduated UTEST companies.

Here’s the excerpt:

UTEST, a collaboration between U of T and MaRs Innovation, is in its fourth year of operation with 15 teams. The program is one year in length and is only available to current students, recent grads and university faculty. UTest invests $30,000 in its companies in return for 5% equity. Two notable alumni are scholarly content recommendation engine TrendMD and mobile keyboard creator Whirlscape.

The article also mentions Slyce as a breakout company from the INCubes accelerator; the company acquired York University technology through a license deal negotiated by MaRS Innovation prior to their IPO.

MaRS Innovation featured in International Innovation magazine

MaRS Innovation and its member institutions are is profiled in International Innovation‘s July issue (#191) in a feature interview with Dr. Rafi Hofstein, MI’s president and CEO, written by Rosemary Peters.

The article is posted on the publication’s website and viewable through a digital interface (pages 80 and 81).

Here’s an excerpt from Dr. Hofstein’s comments:

“Canada’s academic research community is internationally highly competitive, but it has been argued that its scientific commercial success tags behind other countries such as the U.S. and the U.K. While this remains a matter of debate, I do agree that we need to continually encourage additional sources of seed capital to join is so as to allow for accelerated advancement of early-stage technologies. Industry needs to become much more engaged in advancing early-stage (and promising!) technologies emerging from the academic sector, which are usually young and in significant attention, navigation, management expertise and seed capital provisions. These are areas of rising importance in Canada, as many innovations fall into the ‘valley of death’ due to a lack of proper funding, or they leave the country and flourish in the U.S. where funding is more abundant.

MaRS Innovation joins new financing round for AvidBiologics Inc.

September 29, 2014
Susanne Staer
Formation Biologics

TORONTO, Sept. 29, 2014 — AvidBiologics Inc., an oncology drug development company, today announced the closing of a financing round. The company is founded on antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) technologies co-developed with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC).

Led by Lumira Capital, the financing round included MaRS Innovation (MI), MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund (IAF), Rosseau Asset Management, and the company’s founding investors.

This announcement was covered by Dow Jones: Private Equity and Venture Capital and by Canadian Private Equity.

Today’s financing builds on prior support from the Ontario Centres of Excellence (OCE), the National Research Council of Canada’s Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC-IRAP), Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation’s Business Accelerator Program (MRI-BAP) and other Canadian life science development organizations.

“This financing round enables us to rapidly advance our lead ADC into clinical trials,” said Ilia Tikhomirov, President and CEO. “We would like to thank the NRC and all of our partners for their support as AvidBiologics transitions from a discovery-stage to a development-stage company.”

**Dr. Raphael Hofstein**, president & CEO, MaRS Innovation.

“The high quality pre-clinical package and exceptional leadership team, including pioneers in the development of ADCs, position the company for a successful transition towards clinical development,” said Dr. Raphael Hofstein, president and CEO of MI. “The cooperation among funding organizations, such as those involved in this financing, represents the strengthening foundation on which commercialization within Toronto’s start-up community can be successfully realized. We are glad to be part of this financing syndicate that supports one of Canada’s leading life sciences companies.”

University of Toronto’s entrepreneurship programs to share over $3 million from province’s Campus-Linked Accelerator Program

UTEST among the four U of T entrepreneurship programs to be funded through Ontario’s CLA program

The University of Toronto will receive $3,056,000 in funding over two years from the Ontario government to increase its training and support for student entrepreneurship.

The funding is part of the Campus-Linked Accelerator Program (CLA), announced today by Reza Moridi, Ontario’s Minister of Research and Innovation, and Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities.

“Fostering the entrepreneurial spirit among students is a key component of Ontario’s Youth Jobs Strategy, through programs that help transfer their ideas and skills to the marketplace while creating rewarding careers,” said Minister Moridi. “By partnering with colleges and universities to support entrepreneurship, we are ensuring our province’s business leaders of tomorrow are getting the support they need to succeed today.”

With this funding, U of T will continue to build on its long track record of success in this area by expanding the entrepreneurship opportunities it offers to students, primarily through its four principal accelerators: The Creative Destruction Lab (Rotman School of Management), The Hatchery (Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering), The Impact Centre (Faculty of Arts & Science), and UTEST (The Innovation and Partnerships Office, produced in partnership with MaRS Innovation).

The CLA program provides critical funding that enhances the support U of T and MaRS Innovation offer to our current UTEST companies,” said Kurtis Scissons, co-director of UTEST. “It also allows UTEST to expand to work with a greater number of student entrepreneurs in computer software, and is a catalyst for other UT CLA’s to combine their entrepreneurship efforts in a synergistic, complimentary way.”

Accel-Rx, the national health sciences accelerator, launches as a Centre of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (CECR)

MaRS Innovation among founding partner CECRs; Accel-Rx will provide funds to new biotechnology start-ups emerging within MI’s portfolio

VANCOUVER, BC (Aug. 25, 2014) –With the awarding of $14.5M under the Canadian government’s Networks of Centres of Excellence (Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (CECR)) Program, as announced earlier this morning by the Honourable Ed Holder, Minister of State for Science and Technology, Accel-Rx – Canada’s Health Sciences Accelerator is officially launched.

Media coverage of this announcement: CBC’s Inside Politics blog, IT Business Net, and the Funding Portal.

This announcement builds on the previously announced strategic partnership between BDC and Accel-Rx to fund Canadian biotechnology start-ups.

The Accel-Rx Health Sciences Accelerator is a national organization focused on maximizing new health sciences company creation, and ensuring start-ups have the resources they need to enable them to stay and grow in Canada and give rise to a new generation of strong health sciences anchor companies. Accel-Rx therein brings together five of Canada’s leading health sciences CECRs to foster pan-Canadian cooperation and directly address the health science company creation challenge in Canada.

These CECRs include:

CDRD Ventures Inc. (CVI), the commercialization vehicle of The Centre for Drug Research and Development will provide the initial management to launch Accel-Rx’s operations. BDC Venture Capital, as recently announced, will further advance Accel-Rx’s mission by acting as the main funding mechanism for companies created at and/or supported by Accel-Rx, with the intent to invest in up to three to four companies annually, with that number potentially increasing as the partnership progresses.

Financial Post lists Whirlscape as Canadian Start-Up to Watch

January 17, 2014
Susanne Staer
Media Coverage

2014 set to be big year for the start-up and UTEST grad

Whirlscape’s Minuum keyboard leads the way in Matthew Braga‘s January 5 Financial Post article highlighting promising start-ups from across Canada.

In 2013, Whirlscape’s Minuum keyboard app debuted at number 2 on Google’s Top New Paid Apps List after raising over $87,000 on an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign. They’ve also been accepted into Y Combinator, a prestigious U.S. accelerator program.

Here’s an excerpt from the article:

Minuum’s potential goes far beyond improved touchscreen typing. The company’s so-called “one-dimensional” keyboard approach can actually be applied to a wide range of scenarios, in particular, highly touted new wearable technologies like Google Glass, and motion-sensing technologies such as Microsoft’s Kinect and the Leap Motion 3D controller, enabling users to type “anywhere.”

OtoSim CEO on growing a successful start-up company with help from MaRS Innovation

December 18, 2013
Susanne Staer
Media Coverage

Dr. Andrew (Andy) Sinclair, OtoSim’s CEO, was interviewed by PharmaBoadroom.com on October 10, 2013 to discuss the company’s success and plans for the future. OtoSim's otoscopy training device is revolutionizing…