Stephen Fitzgerald Comes Full Circle

After a career that has included devising an experiment for the space station and creating the first carbon-fibre hockey stick, Stephen Fitzgerald intends to boost the bionic knee brace produced by Spring Loaded Technology.

Fitzgerald recently took over from cofounder Bob Garrish as chief technology officer at the Dartmouth-based firm.

Fitzgerald comes aboard at a time of growth. Spring Loaded

Continue Reading

3 Atlantic Startups at Aerospace Event

When the organizers of Montreal’s International Aerospace Week wanted to showcase 11 global startups in the aerotech space this week, the group of presenters included three companies from Atlantic Canada.

Agile Sensor Technologies of St. John’s, Envenio of Fredericton and QRA Corp. of Halifax all presented Monday at the Aerospace Innovation Hub, attended by more than 100 international aerospace executives from around the world. The audience included reps from such blue-chip companies as Panasonic, Boeing, Rolls Royce and BAE Systems.

Starburst Accelerator, a global aerotech accelerator with

Continue Reading

Smartpods Lands Big Sale with Feds

We hear about it all the time. It’s the curse of the modern office worker. We’re sitting ourselves to death.

So we see standing desks, treadmill desks and bike desks attempting to counteract the effects of sitting for hours on end. But a Dieppe, N.B.-based IT company has a different sort of solution, one that means you don’t even have to think about moving throughout the day since your desk will

Continue Reading

10 Startups To Pitch at Fundica

The Fundica Roadshow has announced the 10 companies that will pitch at its event in Halifax on Thursday at the Innovacorp Enterprise Centre on Summer Street.

The event will feature startups from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec, which will all have a chance to move on to the national competition. Tickets for the event are available here

The Fundica Roadshow holds pitching events from

Continue Reading

Dou It Fresh’s New Hygiene Product

I witnessed the most extraordinary pitch last week — possibly the most compelling pitch I’ve ever seen.

It was delivered by a team of students in the St. Mary’s University Masters of Technology, Entrepreneurship and Innovation program. The team’s name is Dou It Fresh, and they have prototyped a product that will enhance something most of us don’t discuss, unless it’s in jokes.

They’re out to revolutionize douching.

“The subject we’re talking about is very sensitive for some people, but we have to talk about it,” said Anindita Gupta in leading off her team’s presentation.

Douche has two

Continue Reading

SNM Releases Anti-Smoking App

After several years in developing her product,  Hazel Harrison of St. John’s is launching the first part of her product to help wean smokers off cigarettes.

Harrison is the CEO of SNM Global Technologies – which stands for Smoke No More. The company has just released its iOS-based app that helps smokers to gradually cut down until they cut out the habit altogether. Later this year, the company

Continue Reading

Jobs: Dash Hudson and Swept

Dash Hudson and Swept, two of the companies featured at the Amplify conference last week,are looking for fresh talent in Halifax.

Dash Hudson, whose CEO Thomas Rankin outlined how his company used sales development reps to generate more paying customers, is now looking for two SDRs and an account executive.

Dash Hudson, which has been hiring strongly in recent months, helps clients analyze

Continue Reading

NS Startups Doing Well & Doing Good

High-growth innovation companies are great because they promise to become major exporters and employers. That economic potential is wonderful. What’s even better is that so many of these company have a great social and/or environmental impact.

Last month, the editors at the Chronicle-Herald asked me for a look at a few Nova Scotian companies that are doing well and doing good. I came up with a

Continue Reading

Keefe Interim CEO at PEI Startup Zone

Startup Zone, the innovation hub in downtown Charlottetown, announced this week that Doug Keefe would become its Interim CEO. The Interim CEO of the Startup Zone is integral to the continued development and management of Prince Edward Island’s business incubator, the groups said in a statement.

Keefe is the founder of Logikl Technology Inc, which has developed Software-as-a-Service for a number

Continue Reading