Ottawa Business Journal

If you believe that innovation only happens inside semiconductor chips and software, think again. Two social entrepreneurs from Ottawa are determined to improve food security, especially for Indigenous communities in Canada’s North, through innovation in agriculture. Back in 2015, Corey Ellis and Alida Burke co-founded The Growcer and created a food system solution that allows “anyone anywhere to...

The widespread adoption of artificial intelligence in 2023 was the innovation story of the year. It dominated news headlines as well as boardroom discussions. How will AI disrupt existing industries? How can it be used to increase efficiency? What are the broader implications of AI? In this bonus episode of Techopia Live, Michael Curran of Ottawa Business Journal and Susan Richards of numbercrunch...

OBJ publisher Michael Curran speaks with Perley-Robertson Hill & McDougall partner Dirk Bouwer about legal trends that are relevant to executives in the technology sector.

Wesley Clover International occupies a unique role in Ottawa’s technology ecosystem. It’s more than a company. It’s a foundation upon which dozens of technology startups have launched and scaled. Wesley Clover was founded by Sir Terry Matthews, the city’s greatest tech icon. After 51 years leading the local tech scene, Matthews is still hands-on with the company and its portfolio. He is supported...

This year’s SAAS NORTH 2023 conference, held Nov. 15 at the Shaw Centre, attracted more than 1,000 attendees. Known as a hub for Canadian SaaS founders and their teams, the event heard from key players in the Ottawa community like Solon Angel, Kyle Braatz, Julia Elvidge and Sacha Gera. To join in on the fun, Techopia Live host Riaz Sidi took viewers to the event with him, getting reaction and high...

Supervising your employees while they’re at work is tough on its own. Being concerned about what they do outside the office makes it even tougher. But wait, is that really an employer’s business in the first place? The answer? Yes, when your reputation is at stake. Knowing how to determine if you're at risk depends on the employee, their role and what actually happened. Join us as Ottawa Business...

Techopia Live host Riaz Sidi visited SAAS NORTH 2023 conference, a two-day conference that attracted more than 1,000 attendees from around Canada, the U.S. and beyond on Nov. 15 at the Shaw Centre.  At the event, Sidi spoke with several key participants ‒ including Veronica Farmer of Wesley Clover, Solon Angel of FreshFounders, Andrew Lemoine of Autocorp.ai, Aydin Mirzaee of Fellow and Mark Stephe...

Entrepreneurs make the world a better place. They solve big problems and innovate to find solutions that no one has ever considered. In doing so, entrepreneurs create jobs, wealth and even, on occasion, help address social issues. This episode of Techopia Live features the person who is leading the charge for entrepreneurs across Canada, Kayla Isabelle, CEO of Startup Canada. Kayla Isabelle is an...

Eastern Ontario is home to many businesses involved in the agriculture sector. From growers and producers, to transport and processing, it’s a sector that generates tens of billions of dollars each year in Ontario. With this issue of Eastern Ontario Business Journal, we focus on agriculture, “agrifood” and agritech. Our special section, Lay of the Land, gives an overview of the industry in the reg...

Keeping up with employment case law isn’t easy, but it is important, especially when it comes to making sure your employment contracts are enforceable. Employers should be reviewing employment contracts regularly, particularly in light of a few recent decisions handed down by the Court of Appeal for Ontario. Emond Harnden LLP partner Paul Lalonde and associate Zoriana Priadka join us to review th...

Fellow is joining the war on useless and inefficient meetings. Earlier this year, Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke told employees to purge their work calendars of all recurring meetings with more than two people. Lutke suggested that too much time was being wasted in ineffective meetings, resulting in lower productivity for Shopify. Aydin Mirzaee, a co-founder of Fellow and business colleague of Lukte, is r...

Area X.O. has been called Invest Ottawa’s “moonshot” project. On Sept. 27, the campus and its technology were on full display at an event called the Canadian Smart Mobility Demo Day. The event was planned by Invest Ottawa, along with Transport Canada and FedDev Ontario, to demonstrate smart mobility technology, autonomous vehicles and drones. It was attended by more than 1,200 entrepreneurs, devel...

At a time when consumers are looking to save money given rising inflation, Ottawa-based Nuvyyo is providing TV watchers with a chance to cut the cord. Nuvyyo has unveiled a new version of its flagship device, called Tablo, that is capable of receiving over-the-air TV signals and digitally recording shows. Nuvyyo is now owned by E.W. Scripps Company, a Cincinnati-based broadcasting organization tha...

After years of delays, Ottawa-based Telesat has struck a multibillion-dollar deal that should pave the way for its much-anticipated new network of low-Earth-orbit (LEO) satellites. Just days ago, Telesat announced that it was pulling out of its agreement with Thales Alenia Space and instead going with Canadian aerospace firm MDA, which will build 198 advanced satellites. The change, expected to re...

Invest Ottawa always takes a lead role in local economic development, especially when it comes to the technology sector. The organization hit some important milestones in 2023: the tenth anniversary of Invest Ottawa’s founding, the sixth anniversary of Bayview Yards and the graduation of 10 more companies from the IO Accelerator program. The leader of Invest Ottawa is Michael Tremblay, who took th...

In this bonus episode of Techopia Live, OBJ publisher Michael Curran talks with Jennifer Teoh, associate partner at EY in Ottawa and Forty Under 40 recipient in 2020. Jennifer works with CFOs and specializes in ESG (environmental, social and governance) reporting. Jennifer says that non-financial reporting data such as ESG is quickly becoming a differentiator for companies, which increasingly need...

Thanks to the pandemic, it took three years for Fidus Systems to celebrate its 20th anniversary. But CEO Alan Coady says the wait was well worth it. The Kanata-based company recently threw an anniversary bash, gathering most of its employees to mark five years of rapid growth. Coinciding with Coady’s appointment as CEO, the company’s headcount – including contractors – has increased from about 40...

E-commerce experienced incredible highs during the pandemic followed by the lows that followed the health crisis. This topsy-turvy period has caused leaders at e-commerce companies to rightsize their businesses and adjust to “normalized adoption rates” of their customers. In Ottawa, companies such as Shopify, Noibu and Rewind are working to find the way forward. In this episode of Techopia Live, O...

It's a common refrain in Ottawa’s technology sector: You can work in the local sector for decades and still be surprised that you don’t know all the success stories. This is the case JSI Telecom, a company founded in 1979 that has developed a global reputation for helping law enforcement, intelligence agencies and security organizations analyze data. JSI has more than 400 employees working around...

You might think the financial and operational success of your technology venture is based on things like sales, marketing, admin, research and development, and you would be partially correct. However, something that’s often forgotten is mental fitness of leaders in those companies – the people who are making daily decisions that impact the company and its team.

Techopia Live is going to the movies! In this episode, Ottawa Business Journal publisher Michael Curran speaks with one of the original employees at Research in Motion (RIM). Matthias Wandel started working at RIM in Waterloo in 1993, years before the company made its breakthrough into mobile messaging and played an important role in developing smartphones. With the launch of the critically acclai...

Angel investing plays a critical role in the life cycle of early stage technology companies. In Ottawa, that role is largely filled by an organization called the Capital Angel Network. One of the top five most active angel groups in Canada, the Capital Angel Network was founded in 2009 and now has more than 40 members. Since inception, the Capital Angel Network has invested more than $65 million i...

With widespread remote work being a relatively recent development in Canadian workplaces, employers are facing new challenges. One in particular is the inability to directly supervise employees and the increased trust that must accordingly be placed in them, something that is not without risk.

Transportation and logistics companies have benefited from the widespread changes brought about by the pandemic. The shift to e-commerce over the past two years might have slowed down as health restrictions were lifted, but there is no turning back online ordering. Look no further than your average residential street and the number of trucks doing deliveries. Also, the shift to onshoring of manufa...

Thousands of job seekers converged at the Brookstreet Hotel in Kanata on March 28 to meet face-to-face with local technology companies who are hiring. The event, called Discover Technata, has become the largest technology recruitment event in Ottawa, this year attracting approximately 4,000 people and 40 companies. In this episode of Techopia Live, Ottawa Business Journal publisher Michael Curran...