Innovation + Job News

According to BuzzBuzzHome Founder and President Matthew Slutsky, his company was born of frustration. As a developer and consultant to the new homes industry, he found that there was no way to search for properties under development. "If you're looking for resale homes, there's MLS," he says, "but, even though most people start their searches online, there was no central database like that for the new home development industry." So he and his business partner Clifford Peskin started one.
 
BuzzBuzzHome launched in June 2009 as a listing of all the condo and new home construction projects in Toronto -- and throughout Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia. According to Slutsky, by the end of last summer, they were receiving about 5,000 hits per month, "and I thought that was pretty good." After that start, however, growth has been surging. This month, the company is on target to receive 60,000 visitors.

BuzzBuzzHome has grown its staff accordingly -- from the two founders, they've grown to now employ eight full-time staff and four full-time equivalent contractors. Slutsky sees more hiring on the horizon, especially if the right designer or social media marketer comes to their attention.

Slutsky says the company expects to grow in two ways: by attracting even more visitors to the site for its existing services as people learn that BuzzBuzzHome is available, and by expanding the areas they serve. He sees adding more provinces in the near future and, potentially, expanding into the US market.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Matthew Slutsky, President, BuzzBuzzHome

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PowerStream, an electricity distributor jointly owned by the cities of Vaughan, Markham and Barrie, last week opened the first new transformer constructed in its service territory since 2002. The facility, named the Robert Fabro Transformer Station after a long-serving employee of PowerStream's predecessor company, Markham Hydro, will have enough capacity to serve 40,000 homes.

According to information supplied by Powerstream spokesperson Eric Fagan, the company owns 11 such facilities, more "transmission grid direct-connect transformer stations than any other municipally owned electricity distribution company in Ontario," and is the second-largest municipally owned electricity distributor in the province.

Fagan says that the company serves roughly 325,000 consumers now, and is consistently adding roughly 6,000-8,000 new customers per year. He chalks the growth up to a combination of the large-scale development taking place in the area north of Toronto served by the company and to an aggressive program that attracts condo building owners by offering to retrofit their properties with individual-unit metering.

Currently, the company employs 500 staff. And while Fagan says they attempt to keep human resources costs low in order to deliver better prices to consumers, the company is often hiring to accommodate the constant growth. In particular, he says, attempting to meet load reduction targets mandated by provincial authorities next year will mean substantial hiring in the conservation department of the company.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Eric Fagan, Director of Corporate Communications, PowerStream

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Industrial Accelerator, a program announced last week by the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) to help spur on energy efficiency in the industrial sector, should create 5,500 green jobs province wide, the regulator says.

The program offers incentives to 45 large industrial companies who are "direct-connect" companies -- that is, they are directly connected to the energy transmission system -- to invest in retrofits of their facilities to enhance energy efficiency. According to Ben Chin, VP of Communications with the OPA, the job creation number is an estimate from the provincial finance ministry based on the effect of the injection of capital into green energy projects. "These are process changes," Chin says. "The jobs that will be created start with engineers to design a project right down to labourers to build it and maintain it."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ben Chin, Vice President of Communications, Ontario Power Authority

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Over the past month, there's been much reporting -- and complaining -- about the so-called "fake lake" that was housed in the media centre for last weekend's G20 summit in Toronto. Lost in the outrage over federal government spending was the quiet success story of the Toronto company that was hired to build the media centre to showcase Canadian culture and companies to the international media.

Lord Cultural Resources, who assembled and led a team of companies including Hariri Pontarini Architects, Infinite Stage Design, Astound Group and N�ssli Canada to build and manage what they called "a series of engaging, interactive, technologically-enhanced and story-driven exhibits for the International Media Centre in Toronto for the 2010 Muskoka G-8 Summit and the Toronto G-20 Summit," was founded in Toronto in 1981 by Barry Lord and Gail Dexter Lord. The company, according to its materials, was started "in response to an emerging need for specialized planning services in the museum, cultural and heritage sector."

Since then, they have managed over 1,800 projects in 45 countries, and have opened offices in the US, France, Spain, China and Bahrain, and have become what they call the "world's largest cultural professional practice." In addition to the G20, Lord Cultural Resources was also involved recently with planning and implementing the show-stopping Ontario House pavilion at the Vancouver Winter Olympics.

According to their website, they are hiring three staff in Toronto now.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Andrea Ott, Director of Client Relations and Marketing, Lord Cultural Resources

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On June 26, Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced at a press conference that Canada would accept more skilled immigrants -- those applying under the "economic" category -- this year than initially planned. In his speech, he described the decision as a response to the need for economic stimulus following the recent recession. "When I met with my provincial colleagues last week, they all stressed the importance of economic immigration," he said. "As we recover from the recession, increasing economic immigration will help ensure employers have the workers they need to supplement our domestic labour supply."

According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada media spokesperson Kelli Fraser, Canada will admit approximately 10,000 more economic immigrants than it did last year -- bringing the total number of economic immigrants to roughly 163,500, of a total number of immigrants in the neighbourhood of 265,000.

At the same time, the federal government also announced changed to the process, capping the number of new applications this year to ensure that all are dealt with promptly. And the government also proposed to double the economic asset requirements for the investor class of immigrants to a net worth of $1.6 million. A list of the new requirements and proposals is available at the Citizenship and Immigration website.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Kelli Fraser, Media Spokesperson, Citizenship and Immigration Canada

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Earlier this year, Zerofootprint introduced a new innovation: the "Talking Plug." It's an outlet that can monitor a building's energy use � down to the level of individual appliances � and show how much power is being drawn and how much it costs. It could also allow a person to shut off individual outlets remotely, and instantly see the savings in energy and dollars.

That product, which drew notice via an outline of the technology in Forbes written by Zerofootprint founder and CEO Ron Dembo, was just among the latest of dozens of initiatives the company has launched. "We're essentially a about measurement," Dembo says, "once you measure energy use you can see how it compares to others and actually reduce it."

The company launched as a non-profit in 2005, but launched a for-profit segment to manage its Velo carbon-footprint-measurement software two years ago. From its start in 2008, Dembo says the company has grown to 25 office staff today (noting, however, that much of the company's work -- design, manufacturing, PR � is outsourced, so employment might not be the best measure of growth). "Eseentially, in the first quarter of this year, we've generated as much revenue as we did in all of last year," he says. "And back then, it was about the same -- over the year before, about a factor of four. Though I can't imagine we'll sustain quite that pace for too long."

Unless, of course, the right customers come to the table. Dembo says widespread sales of the Talking Plug await a large order of a few hundred thousand to make production scalable. He's hoping the Ontario government will see the value of its interface for use with the smart meters currently hooked up to residential hydro accounts. "We could get this out quickly -- with or without the smart plugs -- just by tapping into the smart meters," he says. "The provincial government could create an industry here."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ron Dembo, founder and CEO, Zerofootprint

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Samir Al-Battran, President of RentCompass, says his company started when he realized that people looking to move wanted information on the move. "We found that the real estate market in Canada  -- and specifically the rental search industry -- did not have any practical solutions that meet today's demands and advancements in technology," he says. "The recent rapid spread of smartphones made it possible to build mobile solution to find information on the go, and that was the inspiring point for RentCompass."

Last week, the company launched a native application for the iPad, a first for a Canadian real-estate search company. Earlier RentCompass launched the first rental application in the country for the iPhone. Al-Battran says he just sees the market for mobile applications getting bigger. "We believe that mobile applications are the future, especially in our segment. Our vision is that people should be able to find apartments or houses for rent on the go, whether they are driving or walking in a neighbourhood that they liked, or while commuting to work or school."

The start-up of three people offers ads for free, and is free for people to download or visit on the web. Al-Battran says that the business plan calls for selling advertising on the site. In the near future, he says, the company will likely be hiring support staff and, down the road, some developers, to complement their core team.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Samir Al-Battran, President, RentCompass

A parade tomorrow will officially launch The Bridging Project in the Kingston-Galloway neighbourhood -- a project that organizers hope will transform a neighbourhood while employing local youth.

According to Karin Eaton of the group Mural Routes -- who are organizing the project alongside the City of Toronto, the Scarborough Arts Council, The Amazing Place and Jumblies Theatre -- says the project came out of the work of a U of T geography department social mapping study. "One issue that kept coming up was that the bridge on Lawrence East between Orton Road and Galloway Road was such a barrier in the community," she says. The plan calls to perform an "art intervention" by painting a mural on the bridge over the course of the summer.

The initiative will employ local youth under the guidance of an artist mentor. As of this week, Eaton was still waiting to hear back from funding organizations to determine the number of summer jobs the program will create, but she says 10-15 youth will be employed on the project.

The June 24 launch parade kicks off a 2pm at the northwest end of the bridge, proceeding to the community market at the East Scarborough Storefront.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Karin Eaton, Mural Routes

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The Mississauga company Woodland Biofuels has patented a technology it says can produce clean-burning automotive fuel from virtually any type of biomass -- including wood and agricultural waste. The process eliminates the need to burn food products such as corn to create ethanol.

Earlier this month the provincial government gave the company a grant of $4 million to build a demonstration facility, expected to be located at the University of Western Ontario's Sarnia-Lambton Research Park, to prove the efficacy of the groundbreaking innovation in waste disposal and clean energy.

"Thanks to Ontario's support we can build a plant that we anticipate will confirm our ability to successfully produce ethanol from renewable waste with breakthrough efficiency. We expect to be, by a significant margin, the lowest cost producer of automotive fuel in North America," said Greg Nuttall, President and CEO of Woodland, in a statement welcoming the investment. "This will not only put Ontario in the front of the global race to find an alternative to fossil fuels but ultimately will also provide Ontario with significant economic and environmental benefits. We are grateful for the extraordinary level of support provided by the province."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Sources: Greg Nuttal, President & CEO, Woodland Biofuels; Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation

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The opening of a Toronto location of the trendy British fast-fashion giant Topshop has been long anticipated. It's location was also the subject of speculation -- as far back as last fall, some were speculating that it would be hosted by The Bay. When it finally arrived with an opening last week, it was in somewhat hipper, cozier quarters, residing in an expanded Jonathan + Olivia on Ossington, a coup for what many consider to be one of Toronto's best fashion retail outlets.

Jonathan + Olivia proprietor Jackie O'Brien originally opened the store on Vancouver's Main Street in 2005 -- the store is named after her niece and nephew -- in response to a quest to control her own destiny. "After 10 years of working in the fashion industry ... I decided it was time to be my own boss," she told blogger Marcus Troy. In 2008, she moved to Toronto to open her location at 49 Ossington, helping to define one of the trendiest strips in Toronto and drawing accolades from the local fashion press.

With the introduction of Topshop to her wares, and the buzz that has accompanied it, O'Brein seems poised for explosive growth this summer. Fittingly, Jonathan + Olivia is currently hiring a store manager and a stylist.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Sources: Jonathan + Olivia, Marcus Troy, torontolife.com, The National Post 

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For a few years now, there's been a trend in retail to introduce "pop-up shops" -- locations that open on month-to-month or short term leases to introduce a store and its new products to a new area. The concept was embraced this week by local retailers Preloved, who opened a new and likely temporary location at 230 Danforth Ave.

"I only lasted 45 minutes before I placed a frantic call over to our Queen Street location for back-up staff!" Preloved CEO and founder Julia Grieve said in an email release. According to company spokesperson Ashley Parr, that frantic call has led to hiring -- and the shop is still hiring now.

Though this was Preloved's first foray into pop-up retail (according to Parr, it won't be their last), the shop has long had a presence in Toronto as a retailer of fashions remade from vintage clothing. The store and label were founded by Grieve in Toronto in 1995, and since then has grown to open locations in Montreal and Australia, employing between 40-60 people, according to Parr.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ashley Parr, Warehouse Manager, Preloved

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The financial services firm Edward Jones was named to the top 10 of the Toronto Star's list of the Top 50 employers in the GTA last week. It's a familiar position for the company, who appear on a variety of "Best Employer" lists every year (including, in 2009, the Globe and Mail's Report on Business 50 Best Employers in Canada List (pdf) and the  "Best Workplaces in Canada" list conducted by Great Place to Work Institute Canada (pdf))

According to Edward Jones General Partner Kevin Birch, the job satisfaction comes from a clarity in the firm's employees' mission. "We don't have multiple foci -- we have one focus. That's to serve conservative long-term individual investors. And that focus is galvanizing and exciting," he says.

The firm -- headquartered internationally in Missouri and locally in Mississauga -- came to Toronto in 1995, and has grown since to employ about 600 people in the GTA. Birch, who leads a project within the company focused on growth in the company, says that Edward Jones expects to hire an additional 440 staff in Toronto by the end of 2013. "By then we'll have over 400 branches in the area, and frankly we'll still feel like that's just a good start," he says.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Kevin Birch, General Partner, Edward Jones

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Founded just 18 months ago, the boutique brokerage house then known as Sandfire Securities attracted buzz from the very start. By January, after Northland Bankcom purchased a stake, they had 11 employees. Today, according to Chief Operations Officer Jonathan Robinson, they are at 51 staff and expect to hire another 20 people by the end of August.

"And it's not just staffing," Robinson says, pointing to the size and volume of recent transactions, "we just completed a $21 million deal [on June 11]. We've become, in the past three months, the largest boutique brokerage house on the TSX."

That growth has led to some recent changes � last week the firm announced it was rebranding itself NCP Northland Capital Partners and launched a new website. To go with its new online home, NCP has also moved into an expanded headquarters at First Canadian Place at the heart of the financial district.

Asked what's been driving the growth, Robinson points to the quality of the staff they've attracted, "The brokerage business is based on relationships," he says, and adds that they in turn has attracted even more excellent people. "Everyone wants to get in early on the ground floor of a successful brokerage," he says. In the immediate future, the company will expand its areas of service -- particularly into oil and gas, perhaps -- and increase distribution to Western Europe and Asia.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Jonathan Robinson, Chief Operations Officer, NCP Northland Capital Partners

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Cinema fans lamented the loss of the art house multiplex Carlton Cinema when it closed last November, and rejoiced when Edmonton-based Magic lantern cinemas announced they'd reopen it.

Those fans will be treated to a weekend of free movies June 30 and July 1, as the promised reopening finally occurs. According to Magic Lantern President Tom Hutchinson, the renovation cost in the neighbourhood of $1.5 million, an update on a multiplex that many said was too cramped for current moviegoing trends. But that's par for the course for his company in Toronto. "We've been kind of dealing with other people's castoffs, which is a little more fun for me," he says. He doesn't much care for "the big-screen experience" that gets so much of the emphasis in the cinemas built today by major chains -- large big-box outlets usually in the suburbs. "When I go to the movies, I like to see a story. At the Carlton, the screens are small -- its not 50-foot screens, but its a different experience, an art house."

Since quietly arriving in the GTA in 2001 under the banner Rainbow Cinemas, the chain has converted four former mall multiplexes in the GTA into first-run neighbourhood movie houses that offer prices that are often less than half what the major chains charge. According to Hutchinson, its been a successful business strategy so far.

Hutchinson says the newly reopened Carlton will employ four full-time staff and is in the process of hiring 20 part-timers.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Tom Hutchinson, President, Magic Lantern Theatres

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In February, writer Piali Roy reported for Yonge Street on an innovative solar technology being developed by Morgan Solar, run by brothers John Paul and Nicolas Morgan. Their panels would employ an innovative technology called Light Guide Solar Optic, which they say would make panels cheaper and more durable. "The family-run business sees itself as a game-changer," Roy wrote.

Recently the Ontario government indicated it might see Morgan Solar the same way: last month the Ministry of Research and Innovation announced an investment of $1.86 million in Morgan Solar's research, through its Innovation Demonstration Fund. The money will help the company refine prototypes and demonstrate the technology's efficacy. The new dollars are expected to create 20 new jobs.

Research and Innovation minister John Milloy cited the province's commitment to making the province a North American clean energy sector leader in making the announcement. "By helping Morgan Solar we are delivering on this vision while creating good jobs for Ontario families in a growing industry," Milloy said.

Morgan Solar VP Nicolas Morgan said the dollars would bring his company's product closer to market. "With Ontario's support we can take another step toward achieving our goal of making solar energy one of the most widely used and affordable power sources in the world."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation

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