A diverse group of entrepreneurs — from a 15-year-old to a group of nursing students to a pair of St. Francis Xavier University professors —have been named winners of the second annual Spark Cape Breton entrepreneurship competition.

Innovacorp, the provincial innovation agency, has announced eight winners will divide the total prize money of $200,000, up from six winners in the first competition last year.

Innovacorp, the Atlantic Provinces Opportunities Agency and the Nova Scotia Economic and Rural Development and Tourism Department — all clients of Entrevestor — organize the

When he was working as a chemist in Iran, Mostafa Aghaei developed a solution from natural polymers that successfully combatted the erosion and movement of sand dunes – a huge problem in the desert nation.

When he came to Canada three years ago, he became an entrepreneur and began looking for local applications for his unique nanocoil product; a natural solution that becomes a fixative when it hardens.

And now he’s on the right track. Aghaei’s company, Biopolynet of Fredericton, has recently struck a partnership with Iron Ore Company (IOC) of Canada, to use the nanocoils to prepare iron

After a career spent proving his adaptability, Gary Dinn is now focused on preparing Atlantic Canadian companies for the global market through his role at a regional mentoring group.

Dinn has recently taken over as CEO of Propel-ICT, the group that runs Launch36, the biggest business accelerator east of Montreal.

Under the banner Propel 2.0, Dinn and his team are aiming to launch 420

The New Brunswick Innovation Foundation’s current Breakthru competition will be dramatically bigger than the 2013 edition, both in terms of number of participants and total prizes.

The New Brunswick innovation agency announced this morning that it received applications for the biennial startup competition from 62 teams representing 108 entrepreneurs from all over New Brunswick. In the 2013 event, there were 47 entries.

The total prizes will almost double to $750,000 in cash and in-kind services. That’s up from $406,000 last time out.  

“This is the highest number of Breakthru entries

Bungalo may be the only company working out of the Volta startup hub in Halifax that can legitimately claim expansion into Prince Edward Island is part of an international growth strategy.

The online cottage rental platform did just that this week, and the “international” part is convincing because the company began life in Iceland.

The tech startup, which is in the process of raising $1 million, has dual headquarters in Reykjavik and Halifax and believes the Canadian market is perfect for its product, which connects cottage owners and vacationers.

Having signed up 500 cottage owners

Though it was a holiday, Pablo Asiron felt distinctly un-festive.

It was -40 Celsius outside.  He was in a land where he didn’t understand the language, or even the lettering on the street signs. And his dinner that night consisted of a Snickers bar he found in his suitcase.

For the sake of a sale, the CEO of Riverview, N.B.-based RtTech Software had come to a small mining town in

Wagepoint, which has developed a SaaS payroll product,  has issued the following press release. The company is a former Volta member, and still has a development team in Nova Scotia.

Wagepoint Announces $2 Million in Seed Funding to Expand US Small Business Market Presence and Product Lines

Led by Extreme Venture Partners, with Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC), Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agencies (ACOA), and Canadian and US angel investors

Waterloo ON and New York, NY, December 09, 2014 – Wagepoint, an HR tech company specializing in online payroll, today announced $2

Halifax mobile game producer Orpheus Interactive will soon release the game version of the wildly popular Sons of Anarchy television series, having reached a deal with Fox Digital Entertainment last year.

Orpheus and Fox issued a statement Monday announcing the new game, Sons of Anarchy: The Prospect, which will be available on phones and tablets in 2015.

The announcement is essentially the debut of Orpheus, which has raised more than $1 million in equity financing and has already assembled a team of 16 veteran game producers in Nova Scotia. It has quickly and quietly become a major

There have been a flood of reminders in the past week of how the region’s universities are developing entrepreneurship programs, each staking out a distinct turf.  

Dalhousie and St. Mary’s both held demo-days for student startup teams last week. The Genesis Centre at Memorial University of Newfoundland held a graduation party for SubC Imaging, a tenant company that makes imaging products for underwater remotely operated vehicles.  There was a seminar on Big Data at Acadia and a business idea competition winner was announced at University of New Brunswick.

Most of the startup-related

The federal government on Friday placed the dollar amount on its contribution to Propel ICT at as much as $2.9 million over five years.

The government previously said the New Brunswick-based operator of the Launch36 accelerator would receive funding under the National Research Council’s Canada Accelerator and Incubator Program, or CAIP. However, it had never said how much the accelerator would receive.

Under its government’s Science, Technology and Innovation Strategy, the government is aiming to strengthen Canada’s position in scientific research while promoting the commercialization