Minority and newcomer entrepreneurs bring incredible ideas and innovations to our society and economy but face significant barriers to reaching the same level as other members of this ecosystem. Atlantic Canada prides itself on close-knit communities and familiar faces. This is a benefit when you’re on the inside of those networks, but can be a barrier for entrepreneurs who are unfamiliar with

Saint Mary’s University is offering a course via its David Sobey Centre for Innovation in Retailing and Services to help local sales businesses navigate the challenges of COVID-19.

The centre’s RISE Again Retail program is a spin-off of its “Retail Innovation, Strategy and Excellence” course. It is cancelled for 2020 but usually offers management training to retail entrepreneurs.

“This is

Halifax senior monitoring startup Tenera Care is among the companies accepted into the Creative Destruction Lab’s Recovery accelerator program.

The COVID-19 inspired course is a joint project with Montreal-based artificial intelligence hub Scale AI. It aims to rapidly commercialize innovations that could help protect public health or accelerate the economic recovery.

Tenera uses wearable

The University of New Brunswick and Ignite Fredericton have announced a partnership to provide local businesses with free consulting services for COVID-19-related projects.

The Catalyst program will see companies submit proposals, and UNB students, faculty members and researchers will collaborate to form consulting groups.

In a statement, Ignite Fredericton said the initiative is motivated by

The anti-racism protests of the past month have had special impact on one Atlantic Canadian startup, MESH/diversity, which is witnessing first-hand the movement’s effect on society.

The New Brunswick- and Toronto-based company was founded four years ago to help organizations become more diverse, thereby improving their productivity and profitability. And the events of the past month – the Black

One doesn’t need to spend a lot of time in the Atlantic Canada startup space before they notice a lack of diversity. Yet, the idea that diversity drives innovation is almost universally accepted.

Founders belonging to diverse groups are used to the fact that there is hardly ever another person who looks like them in the rooms they occupy. This isn’t because diverse groups are not founding

Halifax-based B-Line Analytics, whose software tracks commuters, is developing a contact-tracing service that CEO Aaron Short believes will be quicker and easier to implement than government alternatives.

His company’s flagship product is an app that logs users’ movements when they travel to and from commercial buildings, allowing planners, architects and engineers to identify and accommodate

Startup support organizations in Atlantic Canada are re-opening again, within the parameters laid out by provincial governments. 

For example, Planet Hatch in Fredericton is re-opening with improved safety regulations, as explained in this video. As of now, the facility is only open for tenants and staff to ensure not too many people are present at once. 

We also have an update this week from

Halifax-based Adaptiiv Medical Technologies has won the Nova Scotia Health Authority’s first Health Challenge pitch competition, bagging a $100,000 prize.

Announced in February and hosted by innovation hub Volta, the Health Challenges are a series of five events aimed at identifying technologies to help modernize Nova Scotia’s aging and understaffed healthcare system. Friday’s competition was

The Atlantic Canadian division of the Fondation de Gaspé Beaubien’s AquaHacking Challenge startup competition has announced its five finalist teams.

AquaHacking challenges are nine-month programs held across Canada that see competitors work to solve water-related problems, including issues with potability and industrial pollution. The Atlantic version was organized by Saint Mary’s University’s