Fifteen Nova Scotian companies have won a total of $590,000 in grants through Innovacorp’s 2018 Spark Innovation Challenge.

The provincial government’s venture capital and innovation agency announced the winners on Thursday, capping off the second annual province-wide Spark competition.

The goal of the Spark event, which began in Cape Breton five years ago, is to identify promising early-stage

How much do you think hungover university students would pay for a Gatorade to be delivered right to them the morning after a wild bender? Five dollars and eighty-nine cents is what Johnathan Cannon in Halifax is currently charging with his business Room Service.

Room Service is a mobile convenience store where users can place orders online and have Cannon or someone from his team deliver the

The Yomes Initiative, whose digital product helps tenants gain intelligence on properties they’re considering renting, has opened access to all Nova Scotians as it plots its expansion into larger markets.

Until now, Yomes has been open to users on an invitation-only basis, but it is now allowing any tenants in Nova Scotia to use the site without being invited. Outside Nova Scotia, the website is

Applications for the 2018 BioInnovation Challenge are open to early-stage health and life science companies in Atlantic Canada.

Contestants will vy for $25,000 in seed funding and advisory services for a total prize package valued at $55,000 to develop their business idea.

The competition will be held during the BioPort 2018 conferenceon Nov. 7 and 8 at the Halifax Convention Centre. BioNova,

Burlington, Ont.-based Terrapure Environmental Ltd. last week said it has purchased the Canadian industrial services and waste management operations of Envirosystems Inc., a private-equity-backed company based in Dartmouth.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Envirosystems specializes in providing industrial and waste management services to such industry sectors as petrochemical, refinery,

St. John’s-based Focus FS, a Software-as-a-Service company whose products encourage safety in industrial worksites, has closed a $1.4 million funding round, dominated by a “quasi-equity” contribution from  BDC Capital.

The capital markets arm of the federal government’s Business Development Bank of Canada said in a press release that it is providing $800,000 in quasi-equity financing. The

RetailDeep, the Halifax company that is revolutionizing checkouts at brick-and-mortar retail stores, has been accepted into the XRC Labs accelerator in New York.

The company will receive US$100,000 (C$132,000) from XRC and will travel to New York this month to take part in the 12-week accelerator.

The application process was long and competitive with more than 500 applications, which were

We have four positions to showcase in our Jobs of the Week column today. Dash Hudson in Halifax is seeking two Sales Development Representatives while Cribcut, also in Halifax, aims to hire a Full Stack Developer.

And in Sydney, Protocase, a company that builds custom electronic enclosures, is looking for a new Research and Development Funding Manager to oversee cash flow with the company’s R&D.

Energia Ventures, an accelerator founded by the Technology, Management and Entrepreneurship Centre at the University of New Brunswick, has extended its application deadline until July 27.

The TME team issued a statement saying the three-month accelerator, which works with companies in the energy, clean technology, smart grid, and cybersecurity sectors, will begin Sept. 4 at the program’s new

To help launch its new products, Somru BioScience of Charlottetown is raising a $7 million round of funding, and already has commitments for almost half this amount from government funders.  

During a presentation at the 2018 Atlantic Venture Forum on Thursday, Somru Vice-President Mohammed Moin said the company has secured commitments worth $3.3 million in loans and grants from such bodies as