Innovative Building-Product Company Gets Green Light, Goes to Market

G.R. Green Building Products of Burnaby, B.C. won the $20,000 British Columbia Innovation Council Economic Impact award in the 2009 competition.

The company has since raised a further $200,000, passed all independent tests for Canadian certification of its roofing products and received patent approval for its innovative process to manufacture “green” roofing and siding materials made from limestone and recycled plastic bottles and bags.

GR Green, which has five employees, is poised to enter the Canadian market this spring and then expand into the remainder of North America and selected major industrialized countries worldwide.

GenoLogics a worldwide success

GenoLogics Life Sciences Software took second place in the 2003 NVBC competition and has since raised $18 million in venture capital.

The private Victoria, B.C. company develops and markets lab and scientific data-management software to academic institutions, medical centres and pharmaceutical and biotechnology research facilities across North America and Europe.

GenoLogics entered the 2003 competition with two full-time employees and six co-op students. Today, the company has 67 employees worldwide and expects to hire an additional six to seven employees this year.

Partners at Traction Technologies of Kamloops, B.C. entered the New Ventures BC competition in 2005 and five years later, the first-prize winners are still talking about their competition experience on a weekly basis.

“We got far more out of the competition than we expected—in terms of connections to venture capitalists, business knowledge, just everything,” says Andrew Ross, business partner.

Traction, set up to commercialize innovative transportation technologies, was a spin-off of Forensic Dynamics, a forensic engineering consulting firm. Traction entered the competition with a unique air-winch system for securing flatbed loads on tractor-trailers. It was a timely invention because the new North American Cargo Securement Act mandated new auto-tensioning cargo securement devices.

After raising approximately $1 million in financing and experiencing some initial success with the product, the company has refocused its business on consulting because of the heavy costs of research and development.

Ross attributes much of the company’s current success to lessons learned during the competition.

“It was an invaluable experience for helping us become more confident in running a business.”

In 2007, TeamPages Inc. won the $38,000 Enbridge second-prize package for its online social network for amateur sports teams.

Today, almost 30,000 teams, primarily in the U.S. and Canada, use TeamPages’ online tools to post their teams’ game and event schedules, track game scores and records, arrange carpools and volunteer schedules, and e-mail team members.

Since winning the competition, the company has moved from Victoria to Vancouver, grown from three to six employees and raised almost $1 million in financing. The company has also increased its services, offering league and club packages and online registration tools.

Company CEO Mike Tan says TeamPages should become profitable early this year. Revenues grew 10-fold in 2009 over 2008 and he expects to attract a further 50,000-100,000 teams this year.

Some of that growth will come from English-speaking countries around the world. Says Tan, “We’ve already had some potential international partners come knocking on our door to help bring TeamPages overseas.”

Much of TeamPages success, says Tan, “can be attributed to sticking to, and executing, our business plan, which was reconstructed, shaped, and improved with the help and advice of our NVBC mentors and the judges.”

Highlights over past two years:

• Employee growth: from 3 to 6
• Investment: $1 million
• Customers: 30,000
• Revenue growth 2008-2009: 10-fold
• Expected customer growth in 2010: 50,000-100,000

Resonance Technology International Inc., winner of the 2003 Bank of Montreal first prize, has sold two of its revolutionary resonant hammers, with expectations to sell four more this year and twice as many next year. The resonant hammer uses sonic vibrations to drive foundation pilings into the earth quickly, with no ground vibration.

It has been a long journey to refine the technology and deal with market acceptance issues, but president Matthew Janes says a new trend towards legislation demanding zero ground vibration during pile driving will help his company to move forward.

The poor economy, particularly in the construction sector, initially put a damper on expectations for 2009 but Janes reports that the company has had several promising inquiries this year and is currently working on designs for two European clients.

Resonance currently has three full-time and two half-time employees, and uses B.C. subcontractors to manufacture the resonant hammer.

Since placing second in the 2003 New Ventures BC competition, GenoLogics Life Sciences Software has sold its lab and scientific data management software to academic institutions, medical centres and pharmaceutical and biotechnology research facilities across North America and Europe.

Major clients include Pfizer, which signed a three-year global agreement last November to use Genologics’ informatic solutions software in its research labs.

In February this year, Genologics completed a $5 million round of financing to continue with ongoing expansion plans. This is the company’s third round of financing.

The company currently has more than 75 employees and has experienced strong growth, recently posting 65 percent first-quarter 2009 revenue growth over the same period in 2008.

The privately held company is headquartered in Victoria, B.C. Key investors include OVP Venture Partners of Seattle, Growthworks and Yaletown Venture Partners.

Metalogix Inc., the New Ventures BC 2002 BMO Bank of Montreal first-prize winner, grew to 16 employees working out of offices in Vancouver, Halifax and Dallas to serve more than 300 customers worldwide.

The firm, which creates and sells award-winning content migration and archiving software, was generating annual revenues of $3.6 million by the time it was acquired in 2008 by Insight Venture Partners, a private equity firm based in New York.

Metalogix next merged with Europe-based H&S Software, retaining the Metalogix name. The company’s three founders: Julien Sellgren, Rasool Rayani and Geordie Henderson continue to play key roles, with an external CEO hired to run the newly combined firm.

Today, Metalogix Software has approximately 60 employees working out of offices in Vancouver, Halifax, Dallas, Boston, Bratislava, Vienna and Zurich, to serve more than 1500 customers worldwide. Current revenues are approximately $10 million USD.

Terraprobe Geoscience Corp. took second place in the 2006 New Ventures BC competition. The Burnaby company uses non-destructive Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR) to detect conduits, rebar and other structural elements embedded in concrete, and to locate buried utilities. The technology can also measure corrosion in rebar buried in concrete.

The company has grown to 14 employees and is now profitable, with sales of more than $1.2 million in 2008.
“We’re doing really well,” says company president Csaba Ekes. “Our market share is growing, we can afford better people and better equipment and we’re doing more research and development.”

He says the firm is stretching the possibilities of its technology to try to find ways to detect targets that currently aren’t possible, such as finding deterioration in underground water and sewer pipes. “There’s a tremendous need for this,” says Ekes, “because currently there is no reliable way to inspect the aging buried water and wastewater infrastructure.”

Pure Lignin, a New Ventures BC 2008 finalist, has completed a portable demonstration plant and began demonstrating its technology to prospective buyers this spring. The technology is a simple and efficient process for turning waste vegetation, such as beetle-killed pine trees and sugar-cane waste, into three profitable products: pure lignin, commercial cellulose and carbons for bio-fuels and protein.

The poor economy is working in Pure Lignin’s favour, says Lani O’Flynn, vice-president and CEO. For example, she says, “An integrated pulp and sawmill will generate $250 per tonne of input. Our plant will generate $550 – $700 per tonne of input without pollution.”

O’Flynn says dozens of companies and municipalities have expressed interest in their technology.

2008 New Ventures BC finalist Primisyn has acquired five major clients in Western Canada since last fall and added three new employees.

The company has developed software for financial institutions that takes the guesswork and the risk out of product, loan and mortgage pricing.

“We’re definitely gaining acceptance and momentum in the marketplace,” says owner Todd Winship. He says the firm may hire a further two employees this year but is being careful to pace its growth. “We’re very focused on keeping a slow-growth strategy and making sure all our clients are getting value from what we’re doing.” The company is profitable and is not seeking financing.