Ottawa’s L-Spark accelerator revealed the lineup for its new fall cohort this week, naming seven companies from across the country to take part in its intensive SaaS scaling program.
The Kanata-based program went well beyond the National Capital Region to solicit new recruits. Its SaaS Roadshow toured Montreal, Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo, and ended up drawing in talent from as far east as New Brunswick. That effort is reflected in the cohort: Only one of the seven new firms is based in Ottawa.
After surviving a three-week boot camp, 12 firms pitched a selection panel of industry insiders and investors in Ottawa for their spots in the program. The successful seven now move into L-Spark’s Kanata offices for nine months with the goal of scaling their revenues 10x.
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The new cohort rounds the accelerator’s portfolio to 36 companies since its launch in 2015.
Check out the full fall cohort below:
Iamsick
This Toronto-based startup seeks to fill gaps between patients are providers in the Canadian healthcare system. Patients can find family doctors, book appointments seek prescription refills and more from the comfort of home or their mobile apps.
Heyday
Montreal’s Heyday is cashing in on the chatbot commerce trend. The firm claims its chatbot can provide a more personal, adaptable customer interface experience through “Natural Language Generation.” Personality and tone can all be updated in real-time based on consumer preferences through Heyday’s AI.
Transparent Kitchen
Ottawa’s own Transparent Kitchen throws open the kitchen doors. Customers can view partner restaurants’ ingredients, chefs and dishes to decide if the process is to their liking. Diners who prefer independent suppliers can also take advantage of Transparent Kitchen’s network to have ingredients delivered directly to their homes.
Cybeats
Cybeats from Vaughan, north of Toronto, provides cybersecurity defenses for enterprise IoT devices. Its software provides continuous protection and alerts security officers of any disturbances to the system, along with relevant data to help neutralize threats.
PropertySpark
Taking a social angle on the lucrative real estate market is PropertySpark. The Toronto-based firm helps realtors to publish and advertise their listings on social media, and claims to have an audience as large as 300,000 engaged with its real estate postings.
EnergyX
Toronto-based EnergyX provides an online energy audit system designed to help homes and enterprises to implement energy savings plans. The firm claims that if every home and business in North America used its platform, greenhouse gas emissions could be reduced by 10 per cent.
Eyesover
The Government of New Brunswick’s former Minister of Energy Craig Leonard is the CEO behind Eyesover. The firm uses artificial intelligence for “social media listening,” discovering what relevant discussions are happening on social platforms and how your firm can leverage these debates with actionable data.
