Back in 2011, John Rowe, president and CEO of Island Abbey Foods, received one of the largest offers ever made by the investors of CBC’s Dragons’ Den — $600,000, plus a $400,000 line of credit — to help develop his Honibe Honey Drop.

Charlottetown-based Rowe initially accepted the offer, but turned it down when it became clear that the business he had started with his wife, Susan, was going

The McKenzie Accelerator, based in Moncton, is seeking applicants for its third cohort, which will include five new startups.

The McKenzie Accelerator is a 14-week program which provides business training, affordable workspace, mentoring and funding. At the end of the program, a Demo Day will be scheduled in which the startups will pitch their product idea to potential investors.

The deadline for submitting applications is March 14, 2014. Potential applicants are invited to look at the group’s website for more information. The email address is accelerator@mckenzie.edu.

“If you or

Perhaps the problem is with the word “startup.”

There’s an impressive support system developing for Atlantic Canadian startups, but the problem is that most of the support is focused on the startup phase. There’s less support for maturing tech, biotech and clean-tech companies.

At Entrevestor in the past year, we’ve written about five different accelerators and entrepreneurship courses offered by at least four universities.

There are other announcements expected soon on incubators, sandboxes and the like.

Business formation is a critical aspect of creating a broad group of

As it moves on from the Genesis Centre at Memorial University, environmental monitoring startup EMSAT Corp. is also moving on from the product development phase of its growth to focus on sales, marketing and business development.

Last week, the startup graduated from the Genesis Centre, Memorial’s incubation facility for high-growth, technology-based ventures, and now has its own office in downtown St. John’s. And it is in the final month of Phase 2 of its pilot project with a major Albertan client. The project is going well and the company is looking for new opportunities.

“This year

They all require a visionary. Someone to take a leap into the unknown and take the chance that can change our lives. Dalhousie Student Union is excited to present TEDxNovaScotia "Chances Worth Taking: Innovation in a Time of Indifference!" The event will take place on Sunday, March 9th from 11am to 5pm in the McInnes Room of the Dalhousie Student Union Building.

TEDxNovaScotia prides itself on uniting community members from across Nova Scotia and bringing together bold and inspirational ideas that are taking off around our province each and every day. Encouraging curiosity, questions and

Twenty-seven thousand times last month, doctors from across Canada collaborated on The Rounds, a social network for medical professionals, to discuss health issues.

The Halifax startup, which launched on Feb. 3, connects doctors from across the country, allowing them to ask questions, create local “groups” and discuss medical issues.

Only doctors are allowed to sign up for the basic service and all the information is double encrypted, so there are no concerns about breaking patient confidentiality.

It has already proved its worth, with more than 1,100 doctors on the application,

Entrepreneurship is about to undergo a rigorous scrutiny in the Region.   A ground-breaking research project has just been launched to study the region’s entrepreneurial culture.  The study, situated at the Sobey School of Business under the direction of Dr. Ellen Farrell, maps the entrepreneurial ecosystem.  It has already begun with the first wave of surveys starting this week. 

Using complex network theory, the powerful analysis will map thousands of interactions amongst hundreds of actors to identify how knowledge and communication are fostering innovation and entrepreneurship.

“If

We’re happy to welcome Rebecca Joseph to Entrevestor as our student intern for 2014.

Rebecca is enrolled in a one-year journalism program at the University of King’s College, having previously completed a Bachelor of Computer Engineering at the University of Manitoba.

Rebecca has already proven herself an enthusiastic addition to Entrevestor, and she writes nice clear prose. But what we’re really happy about is to be working with someone with such tremendous technical expertise.

A native of Manitoba, Rebecca is as well travelled as she is knowledgeable. She’s lived in New Zealand and

Having closed two recent deals with international partners, Gogii Games of Moncton is looking forward to gaining more customers and revenue and adopting a more aggressive production schedule in 2014.

The developer of casual games recently struck a partnership with Microsoft to have Windows Phone platforms feature 31 Gogii titles from its back catalogue of iOS-based games. It’s substantial because Windows Phone is the fastest growing platform in the gaming market.

But in a recent interview, Founder and CEO George Donovan spoke more about the company’s distribution with Pocket Gems, a San

Nova Scotia Business Inc. is looking for applicants for LeaderConnect 2014.

LeaderConnect offers Nova Scotian entrepreneurs a one-on-on meeting with any one of almost 50 of the top business people in the province, including John Risley, Kim Mason, Colin Dodds and Frank Sobey.

These people can offer advice on issues ranging from change management to doing business in China.

Anyone interested can apply by April 1 at  www.connectns.ca/leaderconnect . For more information, please contact Nadia Middleton at 902-424-7237 or nmiddleton@nsbi.ca.