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Three women-led Ottawa startups among SheBoot’s latest graduating cohort

November 18, 2024

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Three Ottawa-based startups were among the 2024 cohort of SheBoot graduates after the organization’s grand finale took place at SaaS North last week. SheBoot is a national non-profit that helps female entrepreneurs get funding for their businesses. While the organization now reaches women-led companies across the country, it has its roots in Ottawa. Jane Baird, executive director of SheBoot, says the intensive bootcamp includes everything founders need to get their startups investment-ready, with lessons in marketing, intellectual property, finance, legal, how to pitch to investors and how to handle difficult questions. The 2024 cohort comprised 15 women-led companies, three of which are based in the nation’s capital. Yoobin Lee, founder and CEO of Quip Medical, is a medical student at the University of Ottawa. While working with physicians in clinics during her first year of medical school, she saw that most of their time was spent on their computers, rather than with patients. “It made me start questioning what I wanted to get out of my career in medicine and thought that with the technology we have today, there’s an obvious solution. Things kind of snowballed into what Quip is today,” Lee said. Quip helps automate clinical documentation and physicians’ workflows. Physicians can use Quip’s mobile app to live-transcribe patient consultation, which copies the transcription to the patient’s electronic medical record on the web app. Sandra Veledar, co-founder of I.Liv, found herself at the peak of her career as vice-president of information technology at Farm Boy, but felt personally unfulfilled and burnt out. “I really set out to solve this challenge for myself and to use the principles that made me successful at work, now targeted at my personal life,” Veledar said. I.Liv – which stands for “intentional living” – is a digital learning mobile app that helps professional women find the work-life balance Veledar sought for herself. Through group sessions and connecting users so they may share experiences and offer each other support, Veledar hopes users will be able to take what they learn in the app and apply it to their own lives. Jane Lapon, founder of Atorvia, has been in the pharmaceutical industry for more than 20 years. She and her co-founders, one of whom is a physician and clinical trial specialist, saw a huge gap in the market when it came to addressing kidney failure. “There’s really nothing to treat (patients suffering from kidney failure). The only options for patients are dialysis or transplant. We just decided to come together and do something about it,” Lapon said. Lapon says there is 15 years of research through an agreement with Boston University that goes into the work that Atorvia hopes to bring to patients. Atorvia is a biotech startup that deals in first-in-class medicines to prevent kidney failure. Baird says the Ottawa companies were ambitious and passionate about their projects and making a difference in the world. “Every one of them is so impressive, open to learning and wanting to do better. They all kind of help each other in terms of, ‘Oh, I found a great resource to help with this,’” Baird said. Baird added that the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in the women in the 2024 cohort. As 2024 SheBoot graduates start their journeys on the other side of the bootcamp, Lee says that Quip is working on expanding its products and audiences. “We're taking a deep dive into the billing space within the physicians’ workflow … We're also really excited to launch also with pharmacists, given the new legislative changes coming up for increased minor ailments falling under the jurisdiction of pharmacists.” Veledar says I.Liv is working on business outreach and working on the knowledge they gathered from SheBoot. “We're going to set our sights on next steps when we have the next clearance for the milestones and then we will hopefully be talking about raising our seed round within next year,” Veledar said. Lapon says that she’s excited to keep growing her business in Ottawa. “I'm really optimistic that I'll be able to keep my business in Ottawa … It could well be that Ottawa becomes the place to be in life sciences,” Lapon said. Atorvia is in a pre-clinical phase trials for its kidney-saving drug and hopes to get into medical trials within the next 18 months. Lapon says she would love to continue supporting SheBoot. “I'm hoping that I can maybe come back in a year or two, not just as a SheBoot alumni, but actually as somebody to support founders moving forward and just help grow the ecosystem locally.”