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Five Startups chosen for GrowLab’s First Vancouver Program

34 points by joegaudet 15y ago

plainOldText 15y ago
Vancouver has a lot of catch up to do with other cities in US. I'm glad to see it's heading in the right direction though.
joegaudet 15y ago
I am a cofounder of Matygo (one of the 5 companies) very excited to be a part of the first cohort!
- mcrider 15y ago
  And Beverly Crusher is one of your users (http://www.matygo.com/features.html http://www.matygo.com/features.html)! Interesting stuff you guys are doing. Are you hiring yet? I live down the street from your offices :) BTW, your blog page seems to be down.
  - joegaudet 15y ago
    hmmm the blog is hosted by tumblr. blog.matygo.com. We are in GrowLab now, hopefully we will be in talent acquisition mode by the end of the program.
    - mcrider 15y ago
      Temporary hiccough on my end I guess, its working now. Good luck with your project, I wish I had when I was in university (WebCT is a mess).
untog 15y ago
Glad to see Vancouver making strides in incubating startups - I think there is a lot of space in Canada for this sort of thing. Sadly I had to leave a few years ago as my visa had expired. Has Canada implemented any kind of Startup Entrepreneur visa yet? I'm in the US right now, but they still haven't implemented their Startup Visa yet, and given the current state of Congress I'm wondering if they ever will.
- mcrider 15y ago
  Nothing really, although there is business class immigration. Basically you pay half a million dollars and you get a visa. The newest immigration path is the canadian experience class. Its a fairly streamlined process if you post-secondary education and/or a couple years of work experience in Canada. Or you can do what I did and shack up with a Canadian :)
  - untog 15y ago
    Ah, same as last time I looked then. About my only option is to spend a few years at university before launching a startup. Not really a practical path forward...
- jamesteow 15y ago
  "I think there is a lot of space in Canada for this sort of thing." Agreed, though a lot of the talented devs/designers end up moving to the U.S.
rdl 15y ago
Is this related to Bootup Labs?
- will_lam 15y ago
  it arose from the ashes of Bootup Labs
eddanger 15y ago
Really cool to see Vancouver jump on the start up bandwagon. We applied hoping for just the mentorship chunk, but I think they were looking for participants for the whole she-bang. Would be interested to find a mentorship/marketing knowledge "incubator" for an already established corp.
ashishg 15y ago
Excited to see what comes out of this program! I believe they're putting out applications for their 2nd intake around November

34 points by joegaudet 15y ago

Vancouver has a lot of catch up to do with other cities in US. I'm glad to see it's heading in the right direction though.

joegaudet 15y ago

I am a cofounder of Matygo (one of the 5 companies) very excited to be a part of the first cohort!

mcrider 15y ago
And Beverly Crusher is one of your users (http://www.matygo.com/features.html http://www.matygo.com/features.html)! Interesting stuff you guys are doing. Are you hiring yet? I live down the street from your offices :) BTW, your blog page seems to be down.
- joegaudet 15y ago
  hmmm the blog is hosted by tumblr. blog.matygo.com. We are in GrowLab now, hopefully we will be in talent acquisition mode by the end of the program.
  - mcrider 15y ago
    Temporary hiccough on my end I guess, its working now. Good luck with your project, I wish I had when I was in university (WebCT is a mess).

untog 15y ago

Glad to see Vancouver making strides in incubating startups - I think there is a lot of space in Canada for this sort of thing. Sadly I had to leave a few years ago as my visa had expired. Has Canada implemented any kind of Startup Entrepreneur visa yet? I'm in the US right now, but they still haven't implemented their Startup Visa yet, and given the current state of Congress I'm wondering if they ever will.

mcrider 15y ago
Nothing really, although there is business class immigration. Basically you pay half a million dollars and you get a visa. The newest immigration path is the canadian experience class. Its a fairly streamlined process if you post-secondary education and/or a couple years of work experience in Canada. Or you can do what I did and shack up with a Canadian :)
- untog 15y ago
  Ah, same as last time I looked then. About my only option is to spend a few years at university before launching a startup. Not really a practical path forward...
jamesteow 15y ago
"I think there is a lot of space in Canada for this sort of thing." Agreed, though a lot of the talented devs/designers end up moving to the U.S.

rdl 15y ago

Is this related to Bootup Labs?

will_lam 15y ago
it arose from the ashes of Bootup Labs

eddanger 15y ago

Really cool to see Vancouver jump on the start up bandwagon. We applied hoping for just the mentorship chunk, but I think they were looking for participants for the whole she-bang. Would be interested to find a mentorship/marketing knowledge "incubator" for an already established corp.

ashishg 15y ago

Excited to see what comes out of this program! I believe they're putting out applications for their 2nd intake around November