What The Tech?

Today we welcome onto the show Developa Founder Beth Nevins. Developa is a people and talent consultancy with deep expertise and experience operating in and supporting start-ups backed by Tiger Global, Sequoia, Target Global, Balderton, and Atomico. As experts in People & Talent, Beth and her team work as advisors, coaches, and consultants to help startups accelerate and realize their vision.Outside of Developa, Beth has extensive experience at tech-driven startups helping steer people ops and strategy at business from seed stage to commercial growth, international expansion, and following investment rounds.In this interview, we pick Beth’s brain on what skills and strategies founders can leverage as they navigate the various stages of startup life (and eventually march toward the CEO mantle), how teams should build their C-Suite in the first place, and common challenges facing startups when it comes to People and Talent in 2024.Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

We welcome to the show product development mastermind and tech guru Mathew Mozaffari of Speer. At Speer, Matthew and his team help startups and institutions build tools with proprietary tech, while assisting with end-to-end product development. At the same time, they’re also building apps and tools aimed to help improve our day-to-day lives, working beyond the technological nitty-gritty with a team of artists, designers, engineers and developers who strive to impact the world with their work.Along with establishing a standardized practice for software development  for accreditation standards in North America and Europe, Mathew has led the expansion of Speer's technical practice and business markets to bring in over $5 million in revenue.But beyond his business credentials, Mathew has been a major voice in Canada’s tech ecosystem, having traveled to 6 different countries for various competitions while being selected as a Top 30 Developer Under 30 in Canada already in his career. We're thrilled to learn more about the work Mathew is doing in the space, his strategies for success to date, and what’s in store for 2024. Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today we welcome TravelAI Co-Founder and CEO John Lyotier onto the show. TravelAI is an applied AI company that connects high-intent travelers to the largest travel websites in the world and over 10 million properties through a network of interconnected brands. The company was an early spin-out of Canadian-based Left Technologies (which John also co-founded) and built upon years of experience in online marketplaces and e-commerce. By partnering with the world’s largest travel retailers, TravelAI matches millions of travelers with their dream destinations each year, facilitating more than $1.5B in gross booking value and 6M nights booked since 2016But as we alluded to earlier, this is hardly John’s first go-round as a Founder and entrepreneur. Today and in his past roles, John strives to lead by example, making even the most difficult business decisions based upon what is ‘right’ for all stakeholders, while advocating for responsible growth and championing Sustainable Commerce.It’s a fantastic mission, and we pick John’s brain on his journey into the startup space, experience as a leading entrepreneur, and what’s on deck for the rest of 2024.Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

We welcome Manmeet Maggu, Founder and CEO  at Trexo Robotics. His team are re-imagining pediatric rehabilitation, while also redefining mobility solutions for all people. Manmeet started the company when he found out that his nephew had Cerebral Palsy and was unable to walk. Instead of waiting for the future to happen, Manmeet and his team decided to build the future he wanted to see and made the first-ever exoskeleton that helps children walk at home every day, in many cases for the first time in their lives.Trexos are now being used by top hospitals and customers all over North America.At Trexo, they’re out to create devices that are designed with the user in mind, building wearable robotic devices that can be used at home to help children with disabilities experience walking. It’s a mission that’s steeped in really cool R&D and innovation—and they’re just getting started!I’m thrilled to pick Manmeet’s brain on the incredible innovation his team is driving, his team's goals for the future, and what it takes to drive innovation in 2024. Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

We welcome Francis Beauchamp-Verdon, Co-Founder, VP and Business Development Director at AWL-E, to discuss his mission in the mobility space and the amazing vision his team share. At AWL-E, Francis and his team have developed  a revolutionary method to move electricity wirelessly that not only breaks all boundaries of innovation, but also has immense potential for exploitation. Their mission is to provide industries seeking innovation a way to optimize their processes and make wireless electricity commonplace, while meeting the growing consumer demand for novelty and spatial freedom.It’s a big mission, and one that takes a lot of passion and entrepreneurial spirit to launch, which Francis has in spades. He’s an alumnae of the Creative Destruction Lab, has been part of the Centech MTL incubator, and is part of the MaRS Discovery District Community, to name just a few of the networks Francis has leveraged to drive his world-changing ideas. We’re thrilled to pick his brain on how he built AWL-E, his journey as an entrepreneur, and what the rest of 2024 and beyond has in store!Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today we welcome Shan Gu, Founder & CEO of Foci Solutions. At Foci Solutions, Shan’s team helps organizations build strong software engineering teams and self-sustaining talent engines, with the belief that the best engineering teams are ones that invest in each individual's development and learning.Foci’s development pods work with their clients' software teams to provide coaching and mentorship on solid engineering principles and practices, while helping customers accelerate their product delivery velocity. Part-in-parcel, Foci also helps clients develop internal training and learning frameworks to rapidly ramp up new staff, ensuring a more resilient and self-sustaining workforce.We can’t emphasize enough how valuable this approach can be for innovative founders, especially those driving unique R&D to develop truly innovative products and services. We pick Shan’s brain to understand how he got into this space, the successes he’s seen since launching Foci Solutions, and what’s on deck for the rest of 2024. Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

We welcome a member of the Boast team onto the show, Mr. Matt Funk! Matt is Boast’s VP of Customer Delivery, and has been a critical member of the Boast team pretty much since the beginning! He joined Boast back in 2013 as a Technology Advisor and has been helping steer the ship ever since, today leading our Customer Delivery arm and ensuring that the hundreds of businesses who work with Boast enjoy maximized claims with minimal effort or stress.Along with picking his brain on what it’s been like seeing Boast grow and evolve over the past decade, I’m excited to hear his take on how the funding and innovation landscape has changed throughout his tenure at Boast. From mastering the SR&ED claim process, to expanding into the United States, to understanding what our customers have been up against before, today, and in the future—Matt’s seen a lot!We dive in and understand where we’ve been and what’s in store as Boast continues to grow and help even more innovative businesses maximize their investments into critical R&D. Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

This episode we welcome Ian McCarter, the Director of Corporate Innovation at MaRS Discovery District. MaRS Discovery District helps Canadian startups succeed so they can solve our toughest problems in areas like climate, health and the economy. As North America’s largest urban innovation hub and a registered charity, MaRS provides direct support for more than 1,200 ventures, builds communities of innovators within its 1.5 million square feet of lab and office space and beyond, and spurs the adoption of new solutions — in Canada and around the world. In Ian’s role, he’s focused on creating meaningful, economic relationships between Canadian ventures and globally significant early adopters of innovation. In particular, Ian has been helping energy, mobility, real estate, mining, construction, and heavy industry partners inject Canadian innovation into their net-zero journey.Currently, this mandate includes the Mobility Unlimited Hub, which helps early-stage personal mobility companies bring their products and services to the people who need them most. Through a cohort-based program, startups are connected to the resources, talent and know-how needed to commercialize their innovations so that they can help more people put their goals and dreams in motion.I’m excited to pick Ian’s brain on what it takes to drive innovation in the current market, dig into what urban innovation looks like, and in particular how important community—in it’s many definitions—is to building a successful, innovative business.Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today’s guest is Jason Taylor, President and Founder of CodeLaunch, the FREE seed accelerator event that pairs tech startups with world class dev teams to help them raise. They do this by helping early stage tech startup founders get their digital products off the ground, increasing their likelihood to launch, raise funding, and succeed as a disruptive startup venture. Jason is an advocate for Conscious Capitalism and manages the Improving-CodeLaunch FUEL Fund which deploys investment capital into the growing community of CodeLaunch alumni.So needless to say, Jason knows his way around the startup and tech ecosystem, and is expanding his reach this year by bringing the CodeLaunch party up to Toronto for an event that shines a light on Canadian Innovation. It’ll all culminate in a  North America-wide competition down in Texas this fall.We dive into the details of that gathering, pick Jason’s brain on how he got into the startup space in the first place, and share some of the exciting innovation he’s played a hand in driving throughout his incredible career to date. Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

On this episode of What The Tech we welcome FrontFundr Founder & CEO Peter-Paul Van Hoeken! At FrontFundr, Peter-Paul and his team have built the leading equity crowdfunding platform in Canada, empowering everyday Canadians to invest in companies they believe in, providing entrepreneurs with the essential funding to drive growth. To date, more than 40,000 users have joined the FrontFundr community to help businesses raise more than $200 million.But FrontFundr is just one of the many organizations that Peter-Paul has been a part of that are helping drive innovation across the Canadian and global tech landscape. I’m excited to pick his brain on the state of funding, building a business in Canada, and the nuances of crowdfunding versus other financing channels in our chat.Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.