Innovation + Job News

Three years ago, Mike Arnold of the Oakville-based craft brewery Trafalgar was at a small beer festival at Black Creek Pioneer Village. "I thought to myself, why isn't there a brewery here? Any town in this time period would have had its own brewer." As it turned out, Arnold's brainstorm dovetailed with a desire by the tourist-attraction village to expand its reach to a more adult audience.

Arnold and his colleagues hired local craftspeople to painstakingly recreate authentic period brewing equipment, and in 2009, the Black Creek Brewery was born. The historic brewery's single employee, Ed Koren, serves as both exhibit at the historical site, working away while visitors stop in and ask questions, and as brewmaster for the budding craft brewery. Though the batches he brews onsite are historically accurate and have a shelf-life of only three or four days, the parent company Trafalgar has been working to translate some of those recipes to a modern market.

Recently, Black Creek Brewery, working with Trafalgar, launched its first entry into the LCBO -- the Black Creek Porter, based on traditional recipes from the late 1800s. "Its been a real success, we're adding five or six stores a week," says Arnold, noting that six weeks after its launch, the Porter is now available in 80 LCBO outlets.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Mike Arnold, Trafalgar Brewery/Black Creek Historic Brewery

Ruthie Burd had an autistic son, with all the attendant scheduling challenges that entails. So, back in the early 1990s, she was looking for a business she could do from home, in the afternoons and around his schedule. She remembers reading about a New York entrepreneur who bought sandwiches at delis and delivered them to offices, and wondered if she could do something similar for children's lunches.

She set up shop as The Lunch Lady in 1993, offering to make lunches for schoolchildren, though she says it was nearly two years before she got into a single school as a provider. Today, the business she launched in Vaughan -- she started selling franchises when it got too large for her to manage in 1999 -- has 47 franchises across the country, employs about 235 people, and provides healthy meals in 824 schools as we talk this week (a gain of five schools since just last week).

Burd says that when she started, people didn't really think what she was offering was valuable, but in the intervening years awareness about healthy eating for children has led to rocketing growth. "I think we were a little ahead of the curve. People's attitude to food is changing, and we're really now attracting customers, staff and franchisees who are passionate about eating healthy."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ruthie Burd, The Lunch Lady

At one time, Ontario was home to the world's third-largest biotechnology cluster. Now, according to Cathy Carter, on behalf of the Ontario Bioscience Industry Organization (OBIO), the sector is struggling for its survival.

In response to the economic challenges facing the bioscience industry, health-sciences leaders from across the province are teaming up to form a group called Ontario Bioscience Economic Strategy Team (OBEST), Carter's organization announced (.pdf) last week. The team will be seeking ideas for sustainability in the industry. "OBEST is a unique coalition of stakeholders in our health-science industry contributing unmatched breadth in insight and expertise to ensure sustainability and foster growth," says OBEST advisory committee chair Dr. Daniel Billen. "Health-science is a key growth area in Ontario's emerging innovation economy."

Organizers of the group say that they'll be seeking ideas far and wide and then adjusting their strategy as they achieve milestones -- "an ongoing process of renewal and revitalization as we design it to build around the best ideas," according to OBIO President Gail Garland.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Cathy Carter, OBIO

SunEdison, one of the world's largest solar energy service providers, has had a quiet presence in Toronto since 2007. But VP and Canada Country Manager Jason Gray says that business has really taken off since Ontario's Feed-in-Tariff (FIT) program really started rolling last year. "We had two employees in Toronto, and we hired our third in November 2009." Gray says. "Since then we've grown to 35 employees."

The solar energy giant offers full-service operations, financing, installing and operating power plants. Gray says that the attractive pricing of Ontario's FIT program makes this a location that feeds a solar energy boom. "I travel quite a bit internationally, and Canada and especially Ontario are references that come up quite a bit," he says. "There's certainly an awareness out there that this location is growing as a solar energy leader."

In addition to its own hiring and growth (they are advertising nine open positions in Toronto now), Gray says that SunEdison's projects are creating local jobs through contractors. "We have three large-scale projects in development now that will employ about 150 people each in their construction," he says. Gray also points to SunEdison's deal with Samco Solar in Scarborough, officially launching this Friday, which will see the division of the local auto parts manufacturer produce racking equipment for SunEdison's Canadian projects.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Jason Gray, VP and Canada Country Manager, SunEdison

"Working as a consultant means I've been through the 'on boarding' processes a lot of times," says Yang Yu, founder and president of Prognex Group. "Usually, either my email wasn't setup, or I had no parking pass, or I had to wait a week for my voicemail. I wanted to change that."

So Yu's Prognex developed the startup Clear Onboard, launching later this month at Sprouter's Toronto Sprout Up conference. Clear Onboard offers software to manage the hiring and orientation process. "Most of the talent management software that's available is really enterprise level," says Yu. "We saw an opportunity in the market serving small and medium sized business."

The company -- headquartered in the Financial District and currently run by four team members, including Yu -- has been in operation since 2008, previously offering Yask, a business process management platform that is more enterprise level, Yu says. With Clear Onboard he hopes to prove the concept over the next few months before seeking capital through investors.

Author: Edward Keenan
Source: Yang Yu, President, Prognex Group

Polar Mobile launched in 2007 in Waterloo, across the street from RIM, an appropriate location for a company that would build applications for mobile devices. Now headquartered in the financial district, the company has seen rapid growth. "We've grown from 19 or 20 employees at the start of this year to 40 employees now," says Director of Business Development Jon Zifkin, and the company is hiring three more. And all those bodies have been busy: in late September, the company announced it had surpassed the milestone of launching 150 "superapps" for BlackBerry smartphones, serving 6 million users in 100 countries and nine languages.

"We've had quite a year of deployments," says Zifkin, "We put the R & D development into a solid platform and now we're just seeing our growth keeping up with our deployment strategy.

The company's proprietary platform "SMART" allows clients to develop applications for iPhones, Blackberrys, and Android smartphones.

With a footprint established in Asia, the Middle East and South America, Zifkin says he sees bigger things ahead. "The immediate future is pretty steady growth," he says, "as we continue expanding our reach globally."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Jon Zifkin, Director of Business Development, Polar Mobile

The Toronto Port Lands -- the site of heavy industry on the waterfront since the 1800s -- represents one of the largest soil remediation projects in the world. And rather than "digging and dumping," the standard practice for such sites, Waterfront Toronto has opted to attempt a massive soil recycling project on the spot.

It has partnered with international environmental consulting giants DEC and Tetra Tech on the Port Lands Pilot Soil Recycling Facility to test the effectiveness (and environmental soundness) of reusing the soil rather than dumping it. If it is successful, Waterfront Toronto President and CEO John Campbell says it could "change the way impacted soil is managed in Ontario."

Last week, the project was recognized with a technological innovation award at the prestigious Canadian Urban Institute Brownie Awards.

"We are very proud and honoured that the Canadian Urban Institute acknowledged our pilot soil recycling facility with a Brownie," said Campbell in a statement. "Soil recycling is an opportunity to turn contaminated soil into a resource instead of a liability."

The pilot testing, which began in September, should conclude this month. After review and assessment, the decontamination process is expected to take place over the next 10 to 20 years.

Writer: Edward Keenan

Source: Tari Stork, Project Communications Manager, Waterfront Toronto

A contest from the Toronto Atmospheric Fund announced recently puts a $10,000 prize and up to $15 million in financing up for grabs for innovative business proposals to help solve global climate change.

"ClimateSpark is tapping business ingenuity and competitiveness to spark some creative climate change solutions that can also help companies turn a profit," says Julia Langer, executive director of the Toronto Atmospheric Fund.  "If you believe that a thousand minds are better than one, ClimateSpark offers the opportunity to put an idea in front of a diverse community that will work with businesses to refine and develop -- and then judge -- their ideas."

The contest runs in two phases. The first round, open until December 20, will select nine finalists, who will proceed to a second round in January. The winner will be announced at the ClimateSpark Summit in Toronto on February 2, 2011. All nine finalists will have the opportunity to present their project proposals to a panel of investors from firms that have $15 million to invest. Information is available at the contest website at www.climatespark.ca.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Julia Langer, Executive Director, Toronto Atmospheric Fund

A York University project to give Canadian, American and Mexican social science students a continental perspective on migration and immigrant integration has received funding from the federal government. Last month, HRSD Canada announced $152,680 in support of the project, entitled, Migration Studies Initiatives to Promote Curricular Development and a North American Community.

"Under this program and the broader International Academic Mobility initiative, students will be better prepared for the workforce and exposed to different ideas and new techniques within their fields of study," said federal Minister if Finance Jim Flaherty in his announcement of the grant. "This kind of collaboration will deliver important contributions to Canadian training and development and will make Canada more globally competitive."

The money is granted under the government's Program for North American Mobility in Higher Education, founded in 1995, which funds exchanges and cooperation between university students across North America.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Michelle Bakos, Press Secretary, Office of the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development

When an earthquake struck Haiti this year, Mississauga's Getinge Canada sprung into action, donating a sterilizer and other medical infection-control supplies to the relief efforts. Technicians from Getinge Canada even traveled to Haiti to install the equipment and provide training to Hatian personnel. 

According to Getinge President Doug Friesen, this "humanitarian spirit" is why his company has been named one of the GTA's best employers and one of the best small- and medium-sized businesses in Canada to work for by AON Consulting and Queen's University. "Our work inspires our employees, supports our customers and impacts our Health Care System and the Life Science Industry in Canada," Friesen said in a statement accepting the honour.

The Mississauga business is the Canadian office of Swedish Health Sciences giant Getinge, an innovative company that is among the world's leaders in infection control and sterilizers. Friesen explains that the offices in Mississauga offices have been operating for over 30 years, previously as MDT Corporation and before that Castle Sterilizer Company. Getinge acquired the Canadian operation in 1996. In the GTA, Getinge now employs 60 staff.

Friesen attributes the company's continued growth to its employees. "Our core business has grown by multiples due to our outstanding employees," he says in response to a question by email. "We have a total of 60 employees today and plan to add positions as we continue to grow."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Doug Friesen, President, Getinge Canada

Syncapse says its business is "sizzling HOT" and "growing fast and furiously" less than a month after it announced it had secured $2 million in financing through the Business Development Bank of Canada. Earlier in the year, the company had raised $3.3 million in capital through another round of financing, and it says it has invested $10 million this year in product development. As a result of the rapid expansion, the company is hiring 10 new staff in its Toronto office now.

Founded in 2007, Entertainment District-based Syncapse is a social media provider that builds software that allows marketers to set up their own social media environments to establish relationships with customers. In three years, the company claims 700 per cent revenue growth and contacts with 60 million consumers. They have also established offices in New York, London and Portland, and been named on multiple "companies to watch" and "fastest growing" lists as it was named to Facebook's preferred developer program.

Earlier this month, in announcing the BDBC financing, Syncapse President and CEO Michael Scissons said that the funding would accelerate research and development for their suite of products, and sure enough many of the current positions available are in development. BDBC executive Robert Duffy said in a statement that the financing indicates that Syncapse is "setting the agenda for growth" in a rapidly developing sector. "Syncapse's early successes demonstrate the strength of its business plan and the vision of its management team. We look forward to its continued global expansion."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Michael Scissons, President and CEO, Syncapse

The Ontario Science Centre has launched the 2011 Weston Youth Innovation Award -- the third annual prize to recognize people aged 14-18 who have transformative ideas. Organizers say high school-aged students needed a platform beyond science fairs and classrooms to demonstrate fresh thinking on solutions to problems such as climate change and energy conservation.

Last year's winner, Kimberly Gulevich, for example, explored ways to use "methane capture" to reduce the environmental impact of rural houses that use sewage lagoons.

The winning submission will receive a $2,000 prize and have a multi-media presentation of their project displayed at the Ontario Science Centre.

"Canadian youth have the ability to make a positive impact on our world," Science Centre VP of Science Education Catherine Paisley said. In addition to providing an outlet for youth to express their ideas, the Ontario Science Centre will team up with the award winner to showcase the goals of their project to more than a million visitors a year, giving them an opportunity to promote their activities to a wide audience."

Submissions are being accepted until February 14, 2011. More information is available at the award's website.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Anna Relyea, Ontario Science Centre

The Christie Ossington Neighbourhood Centre, a non-profit agency that serves its community through programs to help low-income and vulnerable people, is currently hiring 16 youth aged 16-30 for a variety of positions ranging from junior marketing assitant to culinary arts worker to junior fashion designer.

The positions are full-time 24-week contracts, funded by Service Canada to help youth who face barriers to the job market, and are especially suitable for youth who have not completed high school, according to program worker Irfan Ali, although all youth are welcome to apply.

The hiring is being done through the agency's youth program "The L.O.F.T.", which aims to give local youth -- especially immigrant, aboriginal, low-income and others who are at-risk -- job skills development opportunities while engaging them as citizens in the development of their own community. Lynn Daly, Executive Director of the Centre, said upon accepting Service Canada funding this summer that this program would be "life changing" for participants, noting that Toronto has the "highest high-school dropout rates in the Greater Toronto Area."

These hiring announcements follow an earlier six job postings also funded by Service Canada -- those employees were scheduled to begin starting work this month.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Sources: Irfan Ali, Christie Ossington Neighbourhood Centre; Michelle Bakos, Press Secretary, Office of Minister Diane Finley

In January of this year, Yonge Street's Piali Roy wrote about Discovery District-based startup Vive Nano, a nanotechnology firm specializing in clean technology, especially crop protection and water and soil sanitation. At the time, company executives said they expected India to be an important market for them.

Since then, things have been rolling along smoothly for the company. Last month, it was recognized in the Canada's Top 10 Competition as among the best companies to invest in in the country. The recognition might well lead to significant capital, as previous companies on the list have secured over $600 million in financing, according to contest organizers. All winners participate in a series of investment forums in the U.S., where they are connected with American venture capitalists.

About a month earlier, Vive Nano announced that its pilot plant had started producing nanoparticles for sale in large volume.

And Vive Nano advisor Hari Venkatacharya noted recently in the Globe and Mail that the company's India strategy is beginning to pay off, as it has now signed two Indian partners to help develop two of its technologies -- a coating to make solar panels more efficient and a next-generation water treatment technology. Vankatacharya writes that for the company, "tremendous growth is anticipated in the next two to three years."

Founded in 2005 as a U of T spinoff, Vive Nano currently operates two labs in Toronto and employs a staff of 18. Fittingly for a company with global ambitions, two-thirds of the staff are immigrants to Canada.

Writer: Edward Keean
Sources: Hari Venkatacharya (via Globe and Mail); Vanessa Caldwell, MaRS blog; Flavio Campagnaro, Vive Nano 

Since its founding in 2004, Mississauga-based Solutions 2 Go has grown into the largest video-game distributor in North America. Last year brought in more than $750 million in revenue (representing 177% growth in the past three years), supplying retailers across the country with products from almost every major gaming manufacture.

Those staggering numbers earned founder, COO and President Gabrielle Chevalier the title of Canada's Top Woman Entrepreneur from Profit magazine last month.  But Chevalier told the magazine she's not prepared to slow down. "I see us as a billion-dollar company. It's a nice, round number." Chevalier said that she expects modest growth as the video game industry continues to expand, but also plans to expand into distribution of other products.

The company has grown from 15 to 180 employees since 2004 (earning it a place on the Profit 100 fastest growing companies list, too).

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Louise Leger, Profit Magazine