A Good Year for Follow-on Funding

One of the noticeable highlights of the Atlantic Canadian innovation community in 2015 is the number of multimillion-dollar funding rounds from venture capital investors based outside the region.

There have been at least four companies that have announced deals worth $3 million or more from VC funds based elsewhere. CarbonCure Technologies of Halifax and RtTech Software of Moncton both

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Explaining Equity Tax Credits

Growth startups have one thing in common: they need injections of cash to drive that growth. Without money, startups may be able to grow, just not as fast. So, if rapid growth is the goal, and investment helps them get there, how do we get as much cash to as many startups as possible?

The answer from all four Atlantic provinces is using equity or small business investor tax credits (in this

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Benjamin Calls for More Audacity

Be audacious.

That was the message Yobie Benjamin had for Atlantic Canadian entrepreneurs when he delivered the keynote address at the Engage 2015 Conference in Halifax this week. The celebrated entrepreneur and funder called on East Coast startups to be as audacious as possible, because it’s the only way to grab the attention of major venture capital investors.

“You need to have audacity –

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The White Cross, By H.P. MacKeen

My grandfather, artillery officer H.P. MacKeen, shown on the left, wrote this poem in Ypres in September 1917, two months before the Battle of Passchendaele.

 

The White Cross

It isn’t a medal or order,

It carries no ribbon or braid

But a token still

As on Calvary Hill

Of the greater sacrifice made.

 

It stands as a lonely sentinel

O’er the place where the hero sleeps

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Planet Hatch, Sally Ng Part Ways

As it charts a new course, Frederiction business incubator Planet Hatch has parted ways with Sally Ng, who has been its executive director since it opened more than two years ago.

Ignite Fredericton Chief Executive Officer Larry Shaw confirmed in an interview Monday the board of the economic development agency thought it was “best to decide to move on” with a new head of Planet Hatch.

“We

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OneNS Report Focuses on Tech

Days after leaving his job with Salesforce.com, Jevon MacDonald wanted to discuss the prominent place the tech community holds in the recently released One Nova Scotia Coalition report rather than his own plans.

MacDonald is best known as the co-founder of GoInstant, the Halifax startup that San Francisco cloud computing giant Salesforce.com bought for a reported $70 million in 2012. Since

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Incubating a Network of Incubators

At the Entrevestor Luncheon in Sydney in the spring, it didn’t take long for the 100-plus attendees to zero in on one essential thing missing in the local ecosystem – an incubator.

The event, which was sponsored by BDO Canada, asked the diners to discuss how the ecosystem could be improved. And while most people enthusiastically applauded the mentors in the Cape Breton city, they thought

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