Got Funding?

Seems like April is a great month to talk about funding – here are a few events you should consider attending if you’re in the market:

BVF: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Raising Money – April 2nd @ 7:30 am. A CCAT breakfast event featuring Marc Elrick, Randy Thompson, Shawn Abbot, and Terry Hughes.

VC Roundtable – April 22nd @ 3:30 pm. Rick Segal, Partner with JLA Ventures, takes your questions about VC financing.

If venture capital isn’t in the cards for you just yet, check out these articles:

Startup Money Tricks #1 by Calgary Technologies’ EIR Kelly Graves. The top ten reasons why you should look for alternative financing before venture money. Top reason: The more cash you bring in before you talk to angels and VCs, the more your company is worth.

Startup Money Tricks #2 by g9 Consulting President Nancy Bozek. An outline of the grant programs available to young tech startups.

Kelly and Nancy have done a great job of outlining the basics, and I’m looking forward to more articles in the series. Both Kelly and Nancy are in the business of helping tech startups grow, so I encourage you to reach out to them if alternative financing makes sense for your startup.

Rant: Hate is a Strong Word, but . . .

I just purchased a new Windoze PC for my wife, and setting it up was an all-night affair. In the years and years that it took to rewrite Vista, I’m wondering if anyone on the team stopped to think about the out-of-the-box experience. And as if Windows wasn’t bad enough, you have to remove all the junk that the PC manufacturer loads onto the box. (Their goal was to make your experience with Windows less crappy, but the opposite actually happens). Then again, it was cheap like borscht and it runs Picasa . . .

Anyways, I’m hoping that someone from Microsoft reads this: The Brand Gap by Marty Neumeier

Lesbians and Mind Maps

Just a quick little weekend rant about letting Google run rampant on your site: I’ve been researching mind maps lately, and came across a startup blog which had reviewed a mind map product. (For courtesy’s sake, I’m not revealing the name of the blog). The blog had also reviewed other sites, including a mashup maker and Yahoo! Search Builder, amongst others. Nothing to indicate that sexuality of any persuasion was of interest.

So naturally, Google placed ads on the blog for a lesbian dating site and mind mapping software.

With all the money and technology we put behind profiling web site visitors, I’m wondering how Google could be so wrong? This is reminiscent of “Tivo thinks I’m gay or Nazi” syndrome that happened years and years ago . . .

New Programs For Alberta Startups

If you’re at a startup that’s looking for funding and partnerships (what startup isn’t?), you might take a look at the following programs:

IVAC Capacity Builder
Lew Turnquist and the rest of the IVAC team are looking to place $10,000,000 in a minimum of 10 companies, on a matching basis. The money is meant to help bridge companies to the point where they become VC fundable. The money is placed on a non-equity basis, and between 2-3x the principal is paid back on royalty agreement. There are a variety of other details and requirements, but interested parties should contact Lew (ping me if you don’t have his contact info) or submit an application form. All the entrepreneurs I’ve talked to tell me that this is one of the most inexpensive forms of investment capital they’ve encountered.

There’s talk of this program being expanded in the future, and I certainly think that bodes well for tech startups in Alberta.

Microsoft ISV Innovation Excellence Award
John Bristowe is seeking applications for Blue Sky, a program that seeks to award a Canadian developer of “a disruptive software application” access to some special Microsoft resources, including a customized engagement plan and some red carpet treatment at Microsoft HQ. This would be a good fit if you run at least part of your solution on Microsoft technology, and obviously, if you see Microsoft on your strategic roadmap. Apply online or contact John for more info (again, ping me if you don’t have his contact info).

DemoCampEdmonton1: March 26

It looks like Cam Linke, Reg Cheramy and Mark Bennett have been successful in shepherding Edmonton’s tech entrepreneur community towards the development of a BarCamp community. There’s always been a rivalry between Calgary and Edmonton, but this is definitely something we should be cooperating on.BarCampCalgary has been providing some advice along the way, as has TorCamp’s David Crow. Locally, I hear that TEC Edmonton has also been very supportive.

If you know someone who might be interested in attending, or a company that would benefit from presenting, please let them know about DemoCampEdmonton.

The Venture Gap

Fellow Canadian technology entrepreneur Albert Lai is quoted as saying “you’d have to be an idiot to start a company in Canada” in the latest issue of of Canadian Business. The article, entitled Venture Gap, highlights the frustrations that both founders and funders face in Canada. Here’s a summary:

• The money raised by Canadian VC firms, declined to $1.2 billion from $1.64 billion, a downward trend that began in ’01.
• American funds accounted for 41% of the invested capital last year, the highest level to date.
• The CRA requires an overwhelming amount of paperwork that discourages foreign investment. “Canada is the only country in the world that does this,” a Deloitte employee says.
• Tax incentives work for the benefit of pension funds, but against VCs in Ontario, thus lowering the capital pool available to startups. Government-led VC investment funds are so small, they are “laughable”.
• The average Canadian VC investment size last year was $5 million. Canadian VCs are too conservative, selling out investments early to minimize losses, but also capping gains.

Lai isn’t anti-Canadian. In fact, he’s a huge supporter of Canadian entrepreneurs, and gives back by helping with the Toronto BarCamp movement, and speaking at events across the country. But sometimes, you have to call a spade  – a spade. Well said, Albert.

Look Who’s Teching

Unlimited Magazine’s article on the tech scene in Alberta features short & sweet profiles on DemoCamp/BarCamp, Tynt, Epiar, Jet Stream Media, XSENSOR, Material Insight, Curve Dental, Ph03nix New Media, Games Cafe, Zigtag, Sidefinder, Paramagnus and a few individuals, including yours truly. Author Jesse Semko attended BarCampCalgary 1 in December, and has done a fantastic job with the story.

YC Founding Partner in Calgary April 7th.

Our friends over at TechRev are putting on what promises to be a great event, with YCombinatorFounding Partner and Founders at Work author Jessica Livingston as the headliner. I love the book, love the YC business model, and can’t say enough good things about them. So, it goes without saying, I highly recommend that you attend this event. And, as an added bonus, it’s free! Register here.

DemoCampCalgary 7 Wrap Up

It was a packed house last night at Vicious Circle, where four intrepid companies demonstrated their wares on questionable A/V equipment and slow wi-fi while background music was emanating from the other side of the bar. And by all accounts, it was a huge hit. The casual atmosphere gave DemoCampers an opportunity to freely mix while enjoying the beverage of their choice, and we saw a lot of mixing going on. A majority of the attendees stuck around for an hour or two after the event, exchanging ideas, advice and business cards.

There are at least two reasons why you would attend a DemoCamp – the first one is to see the latest and greatest stuff from fellow technology entrepreneurs; the second one is to meet some interesting people with common interests and goals. Last night, we succeeded in both areas for many, if not all attendees. Be sure to give us your feedback, as the organizing committee continues to work on making these events even better!

Here’s a wrap up of the companies that presented last night:

Casey Pechet of IVOXX demonstrated the ultimate iPod accessory – it was a voice-recognition device that attaches to the back of an iPod. Still in prototype form, he first gave the command “play some stones” to the device – and a Rolling Stones song played. He gave it a command to “play some Led Zeppelin”, and it did. Then, he asked it to “play more like this”, and the device played a somewhat similar song. The final production version will also be able to accept commands such as “play something higher energy” or “play something slow”. This has huge implications for those of us who aren’t organized enough to categorize our music libraries. The device is slated for an August release, and will retail at $129 as an official “made for iPod”, Apple approved product.

Lino Ramirez of Aranducorp showed us what appeared to be an early build of a predictive analytics engine for charities. The product, when released, will help charities raise more money by helping them to predict and target those most sympathetic and generous to the cause.

Lorand Szojka of JIT Resources showed a customer site developed on their video streaming platform, which delivers private training and corporate messaging videos to enterprise clients.

To round out the evening, Matt Cox and Sarath Samarasekera demoed Shopster, which was described as a fully-networked retail e-commerce solution. For companies and individuals looking for an alternative to advertising-based revenues, Shopster offers a fully-customizable e-commerce store site template, complete with over 1,000,000 items in inventory. Prospective e-tailers set up an account, choose which items they wish to sell, and collect a percentage of all items sold. Shopster handles all of the logistics, including payments, drop shipping and customer service. For vendors offering a product, Shopster acts as a distribution channel. Shopster is a multi-million dollar venture that currently has over 1,400 active stores online.

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Mark your calendars for the next event – it will be held at Melrose Cafe & Bar on April 8th, from 6:30 – 8:30. Sign up here.

Calgary DemoCamp 7: Tuesday Night

Calgary’s 7th DemoCamp is being held tomorrow night at Vicious Circle (1011-1st St. SW – 6:30 pm start), a fine establishment where you’ll be able to enjoy a beverage of your choice while experiencing some great company demos. And speaking of great company demos, we’ve got presentations from Sarah Blue and Lino Ramirez, who are also DemoCamp organizers, and Lorand Szojka.

The presentation I’ve been dying to see for the last 3 weeks, however, is from Casey Pechet of Ivoxx Corporation. He’s got an amazing voice-recognition device for the iPod that will automatically categorize your music library. So, not only will the Ivoxx device interpret metadata requests (ie, “play me some Feist”), but it also performs waveform analysis on your music files, so requests such as “play me something upbeat” or “play me something that sounds like the last song”. They’re going to be in the stores this summer.

Links:
The BarCamp Wiki:
http://www.barcamp.org/DemoCampCalgary7

Register Here:
http://barcampcalgary.com/