Innovation PEI’s Ignition Fund deadline on Friday

Applications for Innovation PEI’s Ignition Fund – which offers $25,000 to launch or expand a business on P.E.I. – must be submitted by Friday.

“The fund is proving popular again this year as evidenced by the number of participants attending Ignition fund information sessions across the province this past spring,” said Economic Development and Tourism Minister Heath MacDonald in a statement. “The Ignition Fund helps new and expanding companies when that help is needed most –  in the early stages of development.”

Qualifying applicants must be startup businesses or entrepreneurs who are committed to establishing and operating new businesses in Prince Edward Island. The products or services must have the potential to be sold outside of the province.

An application form is available here.

$30,000 innovation award for Annapolis Valley

The Annapolis Valley Chamber of Commerce is seeking applicants for its Agriculture Innovation Accelerator Award, the deadline for which is July 31.

The prize package is more than $30,000 in cash, in-kind services, counseling and other contributions from sponsors, said the chamber in a statement.

This annual award program recognizes outstanding agriculture and agri-food-related innovators including producers, processors, suppliers and organizations. The award is intended to help the successful applicant move a project forward to the next phase of development. Past applicants are welcome to apply again.

You can find application forms and information here.

Cloud-A Launches Node in B.C.

Cloud-A Computing Inc., a Canadian public cloud provider, last week launched its first Western Canadian cloud infrastructure node in Vancouver. The new node allows Cloud-A to better service the entire country while offering faster speeds to its western customers, as well as satisfying data residency requirements for companies in B.C.

The company said the new node features all key Infrastructure-as-a-Service components, including compute, network, and storage. Similar to its existing Halifax node, the B.C. node is built on Cloud-A's OpenStack-based cloud platform. This platform gives customers the ability to spin up cloud infrastructure in a matter of minutes from both an easy-to-use web-based GUI and a powerful set of APIs.

"From day one, our mission has been to be Canada's cloud IaaS provider,” said Cloud-A CEO Jacob Godin in a statement. “We are now the first provider to truly launch a full multi-node, OpenStack cloud in Canada. This opens new doors for Canadian businesses who are looking for geographically dispersed data without the headaches of using legacy IT infrastructure."

Cloud-A is the leading provider of public cloud infrastructure based in Canada. It was launched by Godin and CMO Brandon Kolybaba.