Thanks to the 25 people that attended Dave Thomas’ seminar on market research and product marketing. Hope you enjoyed it! And big thanks to Rob, Michelle, Georgia, Tessa, and everyone at VIATeC for hosting us in Tectoria.

Dave gave a similar presentation in Vancouver earlier this year with Claire Booth. If you want to watch it again, or watch Claire’s segment, the video is online here.

To access Dave’s slides, you can download them here.

Our next Victoria seminar is on November 2: Magnetic Startups: Build It Right & Money Will Come with Roger Killen. Register.

And, don’t forget to join us for our regional competition, deadline October 19.

We’re now accepting applications for the 2nd annual BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional (BCIC-NVC: Regional), a boot camp for technology startups located outside Metro Vancouver. The cost to enter is $100 and provides participants with access to the competition’s series of seminars and networking events while competing to take home one of three prizes totaling $60,000.

Last year’s regional competition winners included a closed loop waste-recycling technology, a lightweight, shock-absorbing forearm crutch and an online memorial service program.

For regional startups serious about developing their technology companies, the BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional can serve as a stepping stone to the larger province-wide iteration, now in its 11th year, which will award more than $365,000 in prizes on September 22nd in Vancouver.

“The BCIC-New Ventures Competition has helped launch several of BC’s most promising technology companies, from Genologics in Victoria to RFind in Kelowna. By combining education, networking and mentorship, companies can jumpstart their company’s growth,” said Bob de Wit, Executive Director of the New Ventures BC Society.  “The prize money ends up being a bonus because everyone wins from the experience.”

“BCIC is proud to continue its support of the BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional,” said Mark Payne, Acting CEO of BCIC.  “The competition provides training and mentorship to the next generation of BC entrepreneurs and will lead to job growth and increased revenue across the whole province.”

Upcoming regional events:

• September 27, Castlegar – Market Research and Product Marketing with Dave Thomas, Rocketbuilders
• October 12, Kelowna – Start at the End: Exit Strategy with Basil Peters
• October 26, Kamloops – Magnetic Startups: Build It Right & Money Will Come with Roger Killen

The BCIC-NVC: Regional offers $60,000 in prizes, including a $30,000 First Prize, $20,000 Second Prize and $10,000 Third Prize.  The competition is open to any BC person, resident or business located outside of Metro Vancouver with a technology-focused idea that has not yet secured significant financing from external investors.

Registration is now open. Application deadline: October 19th, 2011, 11:59pm. Visit www.newventuresbc.com/regional-competition for all seminar dates and complete competition information, including rules, timelines and registration form.

BCIC-New Ventures is happy to announce we’ll be taking our seminar series around the province over the next few months with stops in Victoria, Kelowna, or Castlegar.

The first seminar is Assessing the Opportunity with Ralph Turfus next Monday, July 11th in Victoria.

Regional Seminar Series:

July 11th – Victoria: Assessing the Opportunity with Ralph Turfus
July 21st – Kelowna: Media Training for Start-ups with Elisha McCallum
August 25th – Kelowna: The Business Case with Mike Volker
September 15th – Victoria: Market Research and Product Marketing with Dave Thomas
September 27th -  Castlegar: Market Research and Product Marketing with Dave Thomas – Registration opening soon.

More than 100 members of BC’s technology community gathered in Kelowna on Thursday, February 23, 2011 at an invite-only event to celebrate the three early-stage technology companies taking top honours at the inaugural BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional Awards Ceremony.

The broad spectrum of innovative technologies from the 17 finalists included a mobile monitoring system for people working alone, an online service that provides environmental product info and a portable biosensor to detect bacteria in drinking water.

The BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional winners are selected by the competition’s expert panel of judges, who base their decision on which company has the most potential for success.  This year’s BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional winners are:

$30,000 BCIC First prize: Reef Safe Fish (Victoria, BC)

Recent university graduates and siblings, Ashley and Robert Roulston at Reef Safe Fish have developed a closed loop waste-recycling technology that filters fish waste and then combines it with fertilizer to produce fish food onsite.

$20,000 BCIC Second prize: SideStix Ventures Inc. (Roberts Creek, BC)

As an athlete and amputee, Sarah Doherty and her team at SideStix have revolutionized the common walking crutch for the disabled, developing an ergonomic, shock-absorbing forearm crutch that significantly reduces joint compression and the secondary injuries that often arise from using crutches.

$10,000 BCIC Third prize:  MemoryLeaf Media Inc. (Kamloops, BC)

MemoryLeaf’s online memorial service, created by Jonathan Bowers whose family runs a local funeral home, lets users create a lasting legacy for their loved ones through photos, videos and stories. The service, arranged through local funeral service providers, also offers professionally developed resources to help answer questions about the grieving process.

Photo: Danny Robinson, BCIC; Jonathan Bowers, Memory Leaf; Kerith Perreur-Lloyd, SideStix; Sarah Doherty, SideStix; Ashley Roulston, Reef Safe Fish; and Bob de Wit, New Ventures BC

“It was an exciting night for our first regional competition,” said Bob de Wit, Executive Director of the BCIC-New Ventures Competition. “With the support of the tech community, our mentors, sponsors and partners, the regional competition provided many companies across BC the opportunity to take their tech startup to the next level.”

BCIC-NVC: Regional is a five-month competition – a boot camp for business startups – addressing the special interests of BC’s early-stage technology companies and supports BC’s emerging technology industry. The competition was open to any BC person, resident or business located outside of Metro Vancouver with a technology-focused idea that has not yet secured significant financing from external investors.

“BCIC is very proud to support this regional competition which provides BC entrepreneurs with the tools and training to take their companies from concept to commercialization,” said Danny Robinson, CEO of BCIC. “These companies are contributing to our knowledge economy and helping to make BC the best place to start and grow companies.”

The following blog post was written by Alice Lam and was published last month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

In 1991, the Transportation Association of Canada (TAC) reduced and capped the carrying capacity of trucks using pintle hitches to attach heavy trailers. While these weight regulations marginally improved highway safety by lowering the center of gravity on the trailers, they also reduced transportation efficiency and increased fuel dependence and exhaust emissions because more trucks were required to carry the annual volume of freight.

BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional finalist Wolf Trailer Company Inc. has designed new roll-coupling hardware to improve vehicle dynamic stability and prevent trailers from rolling over on top of cars.

Roll-coupled trucks pulling pony trailers, full trailers and roll-coupled A-trains can safely carry up to 20 percent more weight, and comply with TAC safety standards. This improves productivity and profitability for truckers while reducing traffic congestion and negative environmental impacts.

“So far I’ve found the panel conducting and judging the competition to be very knowledgeable so I’m looking forward to the mentoring component as we begin the final round,” said Lawrence Wulff, founder and director of research and development.
“I also believe the most significant benefit from participating in the BCIC-New Ventures Competition will come from increasing exposure to the transportation industry as we promote roll-coupling as a means to make the trucking industry more viable.”
Congratulations to Wolf Trailer Company, Inc., we wish you the best of luck in the last round of the competition.

Winners of the BCIC-NVC: Regional will be announced on February 24, 2011.

The following blog post was written by Lindsay Thom and was published last month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

Victoria-based Reef Safe Fish Inc. is a finalist in the BCIC -New Ventures Competition: Regional, and is vying for one of three cash prizes worth a total $60,000.

Reef Safe Fish is hoping to transform the saltwater aquarium and aquaculture industries with a closed-loop waste-recycling technology that filters fish waste and then combines it with fertilizer to produce fish food on-site. The company’s initial product targets saltwater-aquarium fish breeders. With over 90 percent of saltwater-aquarium fish still being caught in the wild, there is a large demand for captive-bred fish, which would create a more sustainable aquarium trade. Reef Safe is also developing a larger scale model for the food-fish aquaculture industry.

Sibling co-founders Robert and Ashley Roulston entered the BCIC-New Ventures Competition last April and learned so much that they decided to enter the first regional competition, which began last October.

“The BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional “has also been a great way for us to connect with other entrepreneurs experiencing the same challenges as us,” said Ashley. ” Beyond the learning and networking, it has also pushed us to get organized in order to meet the deadlines set by the competition. We are moving faster than we would otherwise.”

To win the competition, the Reef Safe Fish team must convince the BCIC-New Ventures judges that their business is commercially viable.

Winners will be announced February 24, 2011 in Kelowna, BC.

The following blog post was written by Lindsay Thom and was published last month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

In North America, 87 percent of consumers care about the environmental impact of the products they buy, yet only 33 percent actually purchase eco-friendly products. In a marketplace filled with fragmented information, misleading eco-labels and “green-washed” marketing campaigns, it’s difficult to find trustworthy facts on which to base a purchasing decision.

EcoMeter solves this problem. Consumers can use its free web and mobile applications to assess the true environmental impact of more than 350,000 products. EcoMeter crawls the web to collect, organize and analyze product ratings and reviews based on specific environmental values, delivering an easy-to-understand, real-time environmental score for each product queried. It looks beyond eco-labels and green-product claims to deliver an objective environmental assessment. EcoMeter can be used on e-commerce sites or at offline retail stores. EcoMeter does for sustainable products what CarrotLines does for healthy eating.

EcoMeter is one of 20 finalists in BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional vying for one of three cash prizes worth a total $60,000. As title sponsor of the first annual regional version of the BCIC-NVC technology competition, BCIC is strengthening BC’s startup environment while supporting the advancement of BC’s emerging technology industry.

To win the competition, EcoMeter’s team must convince the BCIC-NVC jury that it is a commercially viable business.

Winners will be announced February 24, 2011 in Kelowna, BC.

The following blog post was written by Lindsay Thom and was published earlier this month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional finalist AC Global Systems Ltd. is pioneering the use of a mobile monitoring system to enhance the safety of individuals working alone in remote areas not serviced by cellular networks. Their real-time emergency-monitoring service allows lone workers to check-in or communicate an emergency with the push of a button, communicating their exact location using existing smart phone and satellite technology.

“The BCIC-New Ventures Competition has given us the chance to get direct feedback on our products,” said Mathew Potter, senior account manager. “Throughout our presentation, the judges asked us some tough questions about our core business and the direction we wanted to go in. The process helped us to develop a better understanding of our business and where or focus should be.”

Winners of the BCIC-New Ventures Competition will be announced February 24 in Kelowna, BC.

Images: AC Global Systems

The following blog post was written by Alice Lam and was published earlier this month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

Reducing greenhouse-gas emissions has become a primary focus for countries around the world.

BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional finalist Hydra Cat Performance Systems Inc. has developed is a durable, water resistant hybrid generator that can reduce those emissions. The generator uses electrolysis to burn diesel or gasoline cleanly and efficiently, resulting in less pollution, more power and better mileage.

“As a new company developing a new product, you often develop tunnel vision,” says Marlene Dinsmore, director/business manager for Hydra Cat. “The BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional has really opened our eyes to the path we need to follow.

“Thanks to feedback from the panel and mentors, we are looking at new avenues to market our product and for partners to help us get us to the next level. We look forward to the next and final round of the competition.”

Congratulations to Hydra Cat Performance Systems Inc, we wish you the best of luck in the last round of competition. Winners of the BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional will be announced on February 24, 2011, check back for the results.

Marlene and Dan Dinsmore of Hydra Cat Performance Systems

The following blog post was written by Alice Lam and was published earlier this month on BCIC’s blog as part of a series profiling BCIC-NewVentures Competition: Regional Top 20 Finalists.

In her teens, Sarah Doherty lost her right leg in a tragic car accident involving a drunk driver. Despite her loss, she was determined to never give up her passion for sports and the outdoors. She became an occupational therapist and for years spent much of her time adapting mediocre equipment so that she could pursue the outdoor activities she loves. Her interest in devising better equipment that other disabled outdoor enthusiasts could use led to SideStix^TM, the first modular, forearm crutches that can significantly reduce joint compression and the secondary injuries that often result from using crutches.

SideStix’s shock-absorbing system and rotating/articulating tips accommodate the natural movement of joints, while its ergonomic forearm and grips support the upper extremities so that users can walk comfortably for long distances, even on sand, snow or ice. SideStix is one of the top 20 finalists in the BCIC-New Ventures Competition: Regional (BCIC-NVC: Regional) vying for part of the $60,000 in prizes.

“SideStix has grown from a ‘garden shed’ operation, to a well-organized business, with a manufacturing facility and office on the Sunshine Coast,” said Kerith Perreur-Lloyd, Managing Director of SideStix. “By participating in the BCIC-NVC: Regional, we have been able to focus on key aspects of the business, in particular, revenue generation. The seminars, judges and mentors have highlighted areas of inadequacy such as sales and marketing and emphasized the potentially negative outcome of not paying attention to these critical areas.”

Congratulations to SideStix, we wish you the best of luck in the last round of the competition. Winners of the BCIC-NVC: Regional will be announced on February 24, 2011.

CEO Sarah Doherty using her SideStix on the West Coast Trail (Images: SideStix)