The marquee opening event of Toronto Tech Week returns with a focus on Canadian sovereignty. Hosted at the iconic TIFF Lightbox, BetaKit Most Ambitious: Town Hall will bring together over 500 leaders from across Canada’s tech and innovation ecosystem on May 25 for meaningful conversations about strengthening the nation’s autonomy, security, and prosperity. BetaKit Most…
Toronto Tech Week has announced the headlining acts for its mainstage event alongside the official program calendar as the weeklong citywide tech initiative prepares for its return in May. Cohere co-founder Nick Frosst and Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke are two of the many local tech execs who will take the stage at Homecoming on May…
BY THE OPTIMIST DAILY EDITORIAL TEAM For centuries, the tiny West African island of Príncipe was a place where nature was exploited and people were brought in chains to work it. Today, the descendants of those laborers are being paid to protect it. The Faya Foundation, funded by South African tech billionaire Mark Shuttleworth, launched…
BY THE OPTIMIST DAILY EDITORIAL TEAM Style has a way of feeling most elusive exactly when you’re looking for it. You know what you’re drawn to. You know what you like on other people. But translating that into something that feels genuinely, consistently you? That’s where things get slippery. The good news is that finding…
Montréal venture capital (VC) firm Boreal Ventures has officially launched its second seed fund after securing a $43-million CAD first close towards its $60-million target. Boreal’s second fund will invest in capital-efficient, business-to-business (B2B) Canadian technology startups. The early-stage VC firm announced the news on Monday. It also shared that ex-Lightspeed Commerce president and chief…
A Saskatchewan organization giving entrepreneurs a leg up is receiving financial support to the tune of $910,000, federal officials announced last Friday. Over the next two years, the SK Startup Institute expects to train roughly 1,200 program participants and serve 2,500 clients. The funding comes through PrairiesCan’s Regional Innovation Ecosystems (RIE) program, which invests in…
The federal government has committed nearly $225 million to build out Canada’s ability to send its own rockets into space, including $200 million to lease a dedicated space‑launch pad that will serve as the central foundation for a multi-user spaceport near Canso, Nova Scotia. “While these announcements today are about rockets and launch sites for…
This week, the Government of Canada unveiled a $35-billion strategy to fortify, modernize, and expand the country’s military footprint in the Arctic. The feds are investing heavily to reduce Canada’s reliance on the US, and this latest funding will help build core infrastructure like hubs, roads, and airports in Canada’s far north. These commitments will…
Episode Description: Spring is in the air, and so is this week’s roundup of solutions, breakthroughs, and good news worth sharing. Arielle and Karissa are back together after last week’s Sambhali Trust guest interview, and they’ve got a full lineup: wildlife conservation wins, medical milestones, an environmental project decades in the making finally paying off,…
Toronto-based business-to-business software company Loopio laid off 12 percent of its team in March after reexamining its “long-term priorities.” The job cuts were first identified by local employment law firm Samfiru Tumarkin earlier this month, and have since been confirmed by BetaKit. In an email to BetaKit, a Loopio spokesperson said that the company made…
