You’re building a high growth technology company in BC and you have legal questions.  Every entrepreneur does.

Incorporation options, shareholder agreements, intellectual property protection, employee stock option plans, partnership contracts, consulting agreements, non disclosure agreements, employment agreements, etc.

Join Mark Longo and Brock Smith from Clark Wilson LLP, along with Dean Prelazzi from the BC Innovation Council for an informal, intimate, unplugged, BCIC Soundboard discussion – Legal Speak-Easy on December 3rd at 3:00pm at the Lion’s Pub.

To attend you must be a founder, CEO, or other senior management team member of a BC-based technology startup. Attendance will be limited to 25 and pre-registration is required. If you can make it, be sure to email your most pressing legal question to Mark and Dean in advance.

Mike McDerment of Toronto’s FreshBooks is coming out to Vancouver in one week to present at the Vancouver Enterprise Forum and if you haven’t purchased your ticket yet, you should now.

An entrepreneur with two successful start-ups to his name, Mike talks faster than he writes and can deftly juggle and keep his eye on hundreds of balls at one time. Mike is a founder of the mesh conference, lecturer at Humber College and a frequent speaker at Internet conferences. See what Mike’s up to by reading his blog or catching his latest Twitter updates. Mike loves his work, and would rather be outdoors than inside.

The VEF’s Evening with Mike McDerment is on Tuesday, November 24th at the Vancity Theatre. Tickets are $45 and available online.

Tickets are now on sale for the BC Innovation Council’s Innovation Summit 2010, a 2-day, hybrid networking event, connecting science to business in the agriculture, food and ag-bioproducts sectors.  The Summit includes the Commercialization of Agricultural Technology (CAT) Awards, where four emerging BC companies will be recognized and awarded prizes totaling up to $600,000.

Designed to unite researchers, start-ups, innovators and entrepreneurs with leading BC business leaders, BCIC’s Innovation Summit 2010 is an opportunity to encourage and further the commercialization of new technologies within these progressive sectors.

BCIC’s Innovation Summit 2010 includes companies involved in:

• clean technologies,
• advanced food processing and packaging,
• production of novel food and non-food products
• new food safety and animal health detection technologies,
• new biocontrol technologies and;
• software for control and management of a range of complex systems.

The 2010 BCIC Innovation Summit is on January 7-8th at the Hyatt Regency. Early-bird tickets are $75 until December 18th. Visit BCIC’s website for complete program details.

SFU Venture Connection is holding its annual recognition reception to celebrate entrepreneurship this month and bringing in Club Penguin‘s Dave Krysko to do the keynote.

We are extremely pleased that Dave Krysko, co-founder of the celebrated Club Penguin website for youth and currently Vice President, Disney Interactive Studios, has agreed to speak at this event. Dave helped develop and launch Club Penguin in 2005 and played an integral role in its phenomenal growth and success. The company’s commitment to creating a safe and ad-free online playground helped propel Club Penguin to international acclaim and a partnership with the Walt Disney Company, which acquired Club Penguin in August 2007.

The event takes place on Wednesday, November 18th from 5:00 – 7:00pm at the SFU Segal Graduate School of Business. Doors open at 5pm and tickets are free. Register online before November 16th.

Bob Chaworth-Musters and the Angel Forum are hosting Get Investor Ready – an Angel Capital Overview on  January 19, 2010.

The unique one day workshop promises to provide a real life overview of the angel investment process; Valuation, Due Diligence, Term Sheets and Post Investment Relationships. The workshop is comprised of expert presentations, panel discussions and small group case studies and is designed to be highly interactive with networking time. A faculty of experienced US and local investors, serial entrepreneurs and expert service providers will be delivering the content.

Why attend? If you are planning to raise private equity in the next 3 to 12 months, ask yourself:

1. With volatile public equity valuations, how do you correctly value a private company?
2. Do you have a good overview of the language and ramifications of a term sheet?
3. Are you familiar with the due diligence process?
4. What post investment activities (Board of Directors, Mentoring, Communication) are required?
5. Almost mandatory for pre-revenue companies wanting to present at the next Angel Forum in May.

The first 20 seats are $285. To register or get more info, visit the Angel Capital Overview workshop online.

The Ivey BC Entrepreneurship Forum takes place on November 16th and the company selection committee has received and vetted 36 applications to date. Yesterday they announced the first six companies have been selected to present and 2009 New Ventures BC Finalist Rapid Electric Vehicles Inc. has made the cut.

The Ivey BC Entrepreneurship Forum program for the afternoon is online and Angel and Venture Capital investors and other interested observers are encouraged to register online for the event.

Look for two more companies to be added to the lineup of presenting companies this week.

This month’s BCTIA Impact event is full of New Ventures BC connections – not really a surprise considering the topic: Start-ups that are Built to Last.

Even after identifying a unique business opportunity and commercializing a product, a lot of dedication and talent is required for an organization to secure its future.

Our guest speakers Janice Cheam, President and Co-founder of Energy Aware Technology Inc., David Helliwell, Co-founder of Pulse Energy, and Jonathan Bixby, President and CEO of Strangeloop Networks Inc. have demonstrated significant potential in their early stage companies for sustainable long-term growth.

Come hear how they got to where they are today and how they plan to lay a path of success well into the future.

The Impact monthly speaker series features the winners and finalists from the the BCTIA’s 2009 Technology Impact Award (TIAs). This month features the winner and finalist of the “Most Promising Start-up” award category.

Both Energy Aware (2006) and Pulse Energy (2008) were past  New Ventures BC competitors and Jonathan Bixby sits on the final jury.

Start-ups that are Built to Last is on November 17th from 5:00pm to 7:30pm at the SFU Segal Graduate School of Business. Register online.

To celebrate Global Entrepreneurship Week the Bootup Entrepreneurial Society is bringing Dr. Paul Kedrosky back to Vancouver for a Mentor Mixer event. Kedrosky is a Senior Fellow at the Kauffman Foundation, where he is focused on entrepreneurship, innovation, and the future of risk capital.

As an investor, entrepreneur, and blogger (at Infectious Greed), Kedrosky is a sought-after writer and speaker with a column on TheStreet/RealMoney and analyst gig at CNBC television. Kedrosky will be flying in from California to share his views on entrepreneurship and investing in early stage companies. The evening with be heavily Q&A oriented with plenty of time for networking, so bring your questions and business cards.

The Mentor Mixer with Paul Kedrosky is on Thursday, November 19th at 6pm at Steamworks in Gastown. Tickets are $10 and include yor first drink – register online.

2008 New Ventures BC Winner Saltworks Technologies is the subject of an article in the Economist this week titled Cheaper desalination: Current Thinking. The online and offline piece takes a closer look at Saltworks‘ fresh way to take the salt out of seawater.

THERE is a lot of water on Earth, but more than 97% of it is salty and over half of the remainder is frozen at the poles or in glaciers. Meanwhile, around a fifth of the world’s population suffers from a shortage of drinking water and that fraction is expected to grow. One answer is desalination—but it is an expensive answer because it requires a lot of energy. Now, though, a pair of Canadian engineers have come up with an ingenious way of using the heat of the sun to drive the process. Such heat, in many places that have a shortage of fresh water, is one thing that is in abundant supply.

Ben Sparrow and Joshua Zoshi met at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, while completing their MBAs. Their company, Saltworks Technologies, has set up a test plant beside the sea in Vancouver and will open for business in November.

Read the rest of the article online. Congrats to Sparrow and Zoshi on the amazing International coverage.

Mike McDerment of Toronto’s FreshBooks is on his way to the West Coast next month and he has two stops planned.

On the evening of November 24th, the Vancouver Enterprise Forum is hosting an Evening with Mike McDerment at the Vancity Theatre.

Mike McDerment is the co-founder and CEO of FreshBooks, planet earth’s leading online invoicing app for service oriented professionals, freelancers and teams. Back in 2003, Mike built FreshBooks for his design firm and scratched his own itch. Since launching in May 2004 FreshBooks has touched over 900,000 lives and Mike and his team dedicate themselves to being a great service for people who love their work, and want to focus on it – instead of focusing on their paperwork.

Tickets are $45 and available online.

The following day, McDerment will be leading a workshop on a topic he knows a little about – How to Build a Web App Business. This workshop is stop #2 on a three city tour outside of Toronto that includes Boston and Chicago. McDerment will address many of the questions that entrepreneurs have when building a Web App business.

Thanks to the Bootup Entrepreneurial Society for hosting this workshop at Earl’s V Lounge in Yaletown. Tickets are $100, includes lunch and refreshment, and can be purchased online.