Flagship Podcast

Catherine Ouellet-Dupuis leads the seed fund at White Star Capital, sharing insights on pragmatic VC approaches to AI and what founders should focus on to secure funding. Mohamed El-Barachi (Mo), co-founder of Wrk, discusses the challenges of AI deployment and warns against overreliance on cloud models, emphasizing vendor sovereignty. They both highlight the significant role of Canada in the AI landscape, advocating for a shift away from small-market thinking towards leveraging local talent and resources for impactful outcomes.

In this insightful episode, we turn the tables on Josh Scott from BetaKit, delving into his journey in journalism and passion for Canadian tech. Josh shares his early writing experiences, challenges in the industry, and the invigorating process of reporting on tech startups. We dive into engaging discussions on the evolution of journalism, the state of Canadian tech, the intricacies of venture capital, and the policy landscape shaping the tech industry. With candid reflections on past stories and predictions for future trends, Josh offers a compelling look at the importance of transparent reporting and the dynamic world of Canadian tech.

Étienne shared his journey from founding his own startup to becoming a VC. He talked about what pushed him to start a fund after exiting his company and the unexpected path that led him there. He reflected on his transition from founder life to joining a larger company, Hootsuite, and how that experience shaped his perspective as an investor. Étienne opened up about the lessons he learned along the way, the value of resilience, trust, and playing the long game in both building and backing startups. He also spoke about his partnership with Luis & Varun at Telegraph Hill Capital and their shared mission to support founders in Quebec. Real talk, honest stories, and practical takeaways, this one's for anyone thinking about their next chapter, whether it's starting up or stepping into VC.

In this episode, I spoke with Edouard Reinach, CEO & co-founder of Trampoline AI. We explore their journey, focused on revolutionizing the RFP response process using AI. The discussion covers the genesis of the company, challenges faced in the initial stages, and the pivotal switch to focusing on RFPs. Edouard provides insights into how their platform streamlines complex RFP responses, making the process faster and more efficient, particularly for remote and distributed teams. He highlighted the technology's benefits, like saving significant time and enhancing the quality of responses. The conversation also delves into the broader implications of AI in enterprise settings, the cultural aspects of building an AI-native organization, and the future trajectory of Trampoline.

In this conversation, Etienne Gauthier, an Associate at Inovia Capital, shares his insights on venture capital, particularly in AI and cybersecurity. He explores the impact of AI on cyber threats, urging businesses to adopt tech-driven defenses. Etienne discusses his background in management consulting and the transition to VC, emphasizing the importance of personal branding and networking. He also dives into investment trends and strategies while intertwining his passion for cycling, illustrating how personal interests can enhance professional growth in the tech industry.

On this week's episode, I spoke with George Korkejian, co-founder and COO @ Rozvelt. We discussed his journey from working at Next AI to launching his own startup. We dove into George's experience in the Montreal entrepreneurial ecosystem, his pivot from supporting other founders to becoming a founder himself, and the motivations behind building Rozvelt, a revolutionary product aimed at filtering human breath for hunters and wildlife observers. The conversation covers the importance of aligning founder priorities, the unique challenges of creating hardware, and the innovative techniques used in field testing. George also shared insights into how Rozvelt has quickly gained traction and their ambitious plans for the future.

In this episode, Chris, co-founder of Bio Box, delves into the innovative solutions his company offers to the biopharma sector. Bio Box provides a knowledge and reasoning infrastructure for biopharma R&D, helping scientists scale up hypothesis generation and testing in early drug discovery. Chris explains how their platform integrates various biomedical data sources to enable quicker, data-driven decisions and improve collaboration across research teams. He also discusses the challenges and rewards of building a startup in the biotech industry, particularly in the Canadian context, and shares insights on the importance of productive science and reasoning in drug discovery. Furthermore, Chris provides a glimpse into Bio Box's customer engagement strategies, business model, and his vision for the future of the company. Whether you are a scientist, investor, or just curious about the intersection of biotech and AI, this episode offers valuable insights into the evolving landscape of biopharma research.

Amy discusses her pioneering work at Vopemed, a health tech company developing AI software to enhance visualization during minimally invasive surgeries. Amy explains the challenges surgeons face with traditional endoscopic cameras and how Vopemed's software addresses these issues by providing real-time enhanced image feeds. The conversation explores the company's first market focus on laparoscopic surgeries, the potential for expansion into other diagnostic procedures, and the dual go-to-market strategies involving OEMs and hospitals. Using a proprietary dataset, Vopemed's AI enhances surgical visuals, which can significantly reduce the stress and inefficiencies associated with surgical procedures. Amy also shares insights on the company's regulatory journey, the genesis of the company from her master's program, and the potential broader impacts of AI in the surgical field.

In this episode, we spoke with Lisen Kaci, the founder behind Discrepancy AI. Lisen talks about his journey from working as an AI engineer in document processing to founding his startup based in Toronto. He identifies key industry limitations with legacy OCR technologies and explains how Discrepancy AI is leveraging AI tool-chaining to convert any document into actionable structured data. Their innovative approach focuses on reducing manual review costs by over 80%. Lisen discusses various use cases, including income verification for rental and mortgage screening. He emphasizes their unique, no-code implementation that integrates seamlessly with existing systems. The conversation also touches on the future of AI, industry challenges, fundraising strategies, and Discrepancy AI's next product launch that aims to automate complex report generation.

In this episode, I spoke with Gennady Pekhimenko, CEO & Co-Founder @ CentML - an AI company focused on optimization and efficiency. He successfully transitioned from academia to building one of Canada's leading AI companies. We discuss his background, starting with his educational background in computer science and his research at the University of Toronto and Carnegie Mellon University. Gennady raised $27 million in seed funding to take advantage of the AI wave. The conversation explores the development and optimization of AI technology, the challenges of turning research into scalable engineering solutions, and the realization of practical applications beyond the university setting. Gennady shares insights on the importance of efficiency in AI, the company's approach to optimizing hardware and software for AI models, and the experiences of raising funds and building a team. The episode offers a deep dive into the technical and strategic aspects of growing an AI company and highlights the significance of open-source models and innovations in the evolving AI landscape. The conversation explores the development and optimization of AI technology, the challenges of turning research into scalable engineering solutions, and the realization of practical applications beyond the university setting. Gennady shares insights on the importance of efficiency in AI, the company's approach to optimizing hardware and software for AI models, and the experiences of raising funds and building a team. The episode offers a deep dive into the technical and strategic aspects of growing an AI company and highlights the significance of open-source models and innovations in the evolving AI landscape.