12 TORONTO and WATERLOO

Dubbed Silicon Pucks, Toronto and Waterloo are joined at the hip like the Valley and San Francisco, with Toronto startups having more of a web focus and Waterloo startups being more into mobile. And though startup ecosystems all around the world advertise themselves as being supportive and caring, can anyone really beat the Canadians in terms of niceness? Add to the mix a truly diverse, educated, and relaxed people who are inclusive and open for all subject matters not related to their hockey teams or superior maple syrup and poutine, and you’ll understand why Y Combinator execs remarked that their most qualified YC applicants come from Waterloo. The startup scene in Toronto and Waterloo is booming—that’s one thing Canadians don’t have to say sorry for.

AGGREGATE VENTURE ACTIVITY Q4’15 - Q3’16

VC FUNDING: $1.7B

DEALS: 225

EXITS: 90

5 YEAR YoY FUNDING GROWTH: 38.7%

5 YEAR YoY DEAL GROWTH: 22.1%

Source: CB Insights

ANGELS

Bruce Croxon

Jim Balsillie

John Albright

Perry Dellelce

Peter Schwartz

VCs

Extreme Venture Partners

iNovia Capital

OMERS Ventures

Relay Ventures

Round 13 Capital

WCM Capital

ACCELERATORS

Communitech Rev

Creative Destruction Lab

Highline

INcubes

MaRS

Next 36

OneEleven

StartupNorth

Velocity

Utest

ENTREPRENEURSHIP EVENTS

Camp Tech

Enterprise Toronto

Hack the North

Leadership Waterloo Region

Startup Weekend Ontario

Techtoberfest

TOP LAWYERS

Bennett Jones LLP

LaBarge Weinstein

Wildeboer DelleIce LLP

Q4’15 - Q3’16 TOP FUNDING ROUNDS

Thalmic Labs—$120M

Flipp—$61M

Aeryon Labs—$45.6M

ecobee—$35M

Nvest—$32M

FOLLOW @THEC100 ON TWITTER

In 2010, a group of Canadian-born Silicon Valley businessmen decided to help the next generation of Canadian entrepreneurs, founding C100, which hosts a variety of networking and mentoring events for Canadian entrepreneurs. A few of their many programs:

CEO Summit Networking event between CEOs from the top growth-stage companies in Canada and influencers in Silicon Valley.

Accelerate Series Meetups for Canadian entrepreneurs and investors in many different large Canadian cities.

48hrs in the Valley Canada’s most promising startups are selected to come to the Valley for 48 hours of mentorship.

Charter Member Annual Dinner Invitation-only event with a large turnout of influential Canadian entrepreneurs. C100 presents its ICE award for the leading Canadian innovator, in terms of entrepreneurship and impact on the community.

Hack the North, the largest hackathon in Canada, is sponsored by the engineering powerhouse University of Waterloo. Here are the some of the hacks that were created during the event:

OpenWorld Pokémon A social version of the game Pokémon, using GPS, voice control, and motion sensing to increase interactivity.

Silicon Man An iPhone mounted on a helmet that can be controlled via a glove.

RememberAll Application that works with Google Glass to get real time audio and visual feed.

Lend Airbnb for things, allowing people to rent everything from ladders to Apple TVs.

Signlang Allowing deaf people to speak aloud using Leap Motion.

Flock Facebook-connected smart door lock to control the entry and exit of people based on event attendees.

Botscape A massively multiplayer online game for artificial intelligence players. Program a bot to play the game, then bots compete against all others to highlight best programming strategies.

Spacebowl VR bowling using the Thalmic Myo and an Oculus Rift.

Guava Genomes for User Accessible Variant Annotation for secure patient genome browsing on the Web.

Pinpnt.me Web application that sends a link with your GPS location without a login or requiring personal info.

SOCIAL MEDIA CASE STUDY

Skyrocketing to fame with his tweets about the Meek Mill and Drake feud, Toronto councilman Norm Kelly boasts over 100,000 Twitter followers, teaching us how to effectively create a social media presence.

In the Drake and Meek Kill feud, Norm chimes in, defending the honor of the Toronto-based rapper. Loyalty on social media is important.

Twitter is a great forum to have your questions answered, showing the power of crowdsourcing on social media.

Replying to users tagging you is very important, as good customer service is a must for any up and coming startup. Honesty is also important—here Norm makes no false promises.

A picture is worth a 1000 words, far more than the 140 character limit.

Dialogue with the consumer is important. Even if they likely don’t expect a response, giving consumers a response makes their day.

12

TORONTO and WATERLOO

AGGREGATE VENTURE ACTIVITY Q4’15 - Q3’16

TORONTO AND WATERLOO AT A GLANCE

Power Breakfast

Coffee Shops to Start Up In

Best Bars

Local Brew

Go-to Alcohol

Offline Tinders

“Must Be At” Local Events

THE TOP