The third annual MentorCamp Atlantic will take place at the Delta Halifax next week, linking up eight leading startups with a host of mentors from Atlantic Canada and around the world.

The event is the brainchild of British investor Permjot Valia, who has backed several Atlantic Canadian companies. In 2011, he conceived of a program that would gather eight to 10 startups together with about 30 mentors so the companies’ founders would receive sound advice in a closed setting from a range of experts.

Since the first event in September 2011, MentorCamp has incorporated in Nova Scotia and

When the Atlantic Angels hold their first meeting on Oct. 22, it will represent a huge opportunity to usher new blood into the investment community.

That much we know.

But as I spoke to a few entrepreneurs last week, it became apparent that there are still lots of questions about what the creation of a new investment body will mean for Atlantic Canada’s burgeoning start-up community.

A group comprising investors such as Permjot Valia and Milan Vrekic, the executive director of the Volta start-up house in Halifax, said last week they are setting up the Atlantic Angels, which would herd

Within 18 months, Michael Uhlarik believes the upmarket electric motorcycles he’s designed will be ripping around some of the major bike tracks in the U.S.

If he ever doubted this vision, the CEO Amarok Electric Motorcycles of found validation in June when the Amarok P1A bike, driven by  Canadian superbike pro racer Michael Leon, reached speeds of 100 miles per hour going up a gradient of 17 degrees at the 91st Pikes Peak International Hill Climb in Colorado.  It was faster than competing bikes from larger companies that had cost $30 million to develop.

In the wake of the success at

The Pond-Deshpande Centre at the University of New Brunswick late last week announced the first cohort of entrepreneurs it is supporting with mentorship, funding and other services.  

The Pond-Deshpande Centre’s mission is to accelerate the creation of sustainable, scalable businesses in New Brunswick that have significant social and economic impact. It places greater emphasis on social entrepreneurship than most support groups, which is reflected in the choice of companies.

“We’ve seen a tremendous burst of entrepreneurial activity since we launched the Centre one year ago,” said

I want to celebrate Thanksgiving by letting everyone know that I've concluded a contract to publish The Jew Who Defeated Hitler with Prometheus Books of Albany, N.Y.

I’m thrilled to be working with Steve Mitchell and his team at Prometheus. They have a tremendous catalogue and I’m honored to think my book will be added to it in a year.

The book is virtually finished and I hope to have it to

Spring Loaded Technology of Halifax on Thursday won the third annual BioInnovation Challenge, capturing the $35,000 first prize and gaining further validation of its innovative knee  brace technology.

The top prize at the pitching competition at BioPort Atlantic caps a year of accelerating victories for the young company, whose three principals first met in Dalhousie University’s Starting Lean class in September, 2012.

Spring Loaded is developing a knee brace that strengthens as well as stabilizes the joint. The product can increase the performance of athletes or grant greater mobility

The energetic startup community in St. John’s, N.L., will stage its first Startup Weekend next month, and has already sold out more than half the spots available for the 54-hour technology-business competition.

Jason Janes, a co-founder of Startup St. John’s, and Chris Gardner, the founder of the Common Ground co-working space, are putting together the event for the weekend of Nov. 8 at teh Genesis Centre at Memorial University. It will allow 60 people to spend a weekend putting together companies, the best of which will hopefully become bona fide enterprises.

Where Janes and Gardner

Refuel Systems, a Dartmouth fuel filtering outfit, is looking to increase the deployment of its filtering devices that are now on active service across the U.S. and Canada.

The group builds devices that “polish” fuel, which means they solve a fuel storage problem created by the reduction in sulphur in diesel because of stricter environmental regulations. Though these changes have been good for the environment, they have caused problems in that water and impurities can now contaminate diesel that must be stored for prolonged periods.

Though sulphur harms the environment, it also absorbs

Late last month, USA Today published my latest story on Canadian technology, which featured InteraXon of Toronto. You can find it here. This is a really cool company, headquartered in the trendy neighbourhood around Spadina and King, just down the road from the new Toronto International Film Festival headquarters.

InteraXon’s Muse headsets detect brainwaves and can give you a graphic presentation of your thought processes on your desktop or device. You can’t play games with it, but you can understand how your brain works, when you’re at optimal awareness, how you react to anxiety, etc.

Last week, I wrote that more institutional money is coming into Atlantic Canadian startups, which is good because the world of funding is changing.

That was the good news. But it is counterbalanced by some bad news, which is that too many Atlantic Canadian startups are failing to take advantage of these changes.

Here’s the worse news: there’s a strong belief that some startups are going to go out of business in the next year or two because they will not secure the millions of dollars that it takes to grow. Maybe it’s because of a problem with their business model or their technology,