Altitude Accelerator

Altitude Welcomes New Partner, InsurePlus by Guthrie Insurance: Empowering Innovation for Life Science R&D companies

altaccelerator — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 18:32:10 +0000

By Hessie Jones

Early-stage companies face a consistent challenge: Bootstrapping means they lack some of the necessary support and resources needed to fund and protect their businesses as they grow.

Neil Mahajan, Vice President & Insurance Advisor at InsurePlus by Guthrie Insurance, understands this. He’s been in the insurance business for about 35 years, and his company decided to focus on R&D life science, technology and manufacturing companies. He emphasizes,

“Our expertise has been helping companies get started early on with insurance. For early-stage startups, insurance is becoming a barrier to entry for partnerships and funding: Often, no one wants to speak to them because they are not generating revenue. Also, founders don’t always know what insurance they need or are unable to find the coverage they need at competitive prices. We find that founders will often wait until a contract, investor or partner requires coverage, which creates pressure and sometimes delays growth.”

At Altitude Accelerator, supporting early-stage innovation means more than just funding and mentorship—it’s about helping companies build a strong, sustainable foundation. That’s why we have partnered with Guthrie Insurance to bring a tailored insurance solution for our founders.

For Mahajan, the partnership with Altitude is a great fit as he remarks,

“At the early stage, founders move quickly and make critical decisions—but insurance is often overlooked or misunderstood. Partnering with Altitude Accelerator gives us the opportunity to support founders early, before gaps arise or opportunities are at risk.”

He explains that Guthrie Insurance’s role is to “simplify that—helping founders understand their risks in plain language and prioritize what matters at each stage.”

Why Insurance is Essential at the R&D Phase

Mahajan adds that for life science companies, their unique set of risks—unlike traditional startups— means that their sensitive research, their required specialized equipment often exposes them to much higher levels of investor and regulatory scrutiny.

These include:

Research & Development Risk – Damage to lab equipment, materials, or ongoing experiments can significantly delay timelines and increase costs.

Liability Exposure – Even without commercial products, companies may face liability risks from their operations or early-stage collaborations.

Investor & Governance Risk- Directors and officers are often required to carry liability protection as part of funding agreements.

Business Interruption – Unexpected disruptions can halt critical research and jeopardize funding milestones.

Cyber Risk – Increasingly relevant as research data, IP, and partnerships rely on secure digital systems.

Scalable Insurance as a Company Grows

Mahajan realized early on with clients within the life science sector that there was a greater need to support founders in this area. Through this partnership with Altitude, life science companies can access cost-effective “simple, scalable insurance packages tailored to their stage of growth.” As he emphasizes, the program is designed to grow alongside the company, giving founders the essential protection and scale their coverage as they move from pre-revenue to clinical or commercialization stages.

This unique solution from Guthrie is geared to provide the right coverage that will reduce friction, providing more credibility as the company grows. Mahajan explains that for companies this means,

“Founders will be able to satisfy investor requirements more readily and will ease partner contracts or investor agreements. In addition, they are assured protection of their critical research and assets, while demonstrating operational maturity and risk awareness.”

Ready-to-Bind Insurance Program for Early-Stage R&D companies

Specifically built for early-stage R&D companies, this InsurePlus program allows you to check those boxes quickly, without overpaying or overcomplicating things:

What’s included in the program:

$5M Commercial General Liability (meets most lease/investor requirements)

Products & E&O Liability (as you move toward commercialization)

Directors & Officers (D&O) (often required by investors)

Property + R&D stock coverage (including lab equipment & materials)

Business interruption to protect ongoing research

Optional: Cyber coverage up to $1M (increasingly requested by partners and institutions)

This is built for companies with:

Less than $100K revenue
Under 15 employees
No commercial product sales yet

The goal is simple: get you investor ready and contract-ready now, and scale coverage as you grow.

We are hosting the in-person hours with the expert advisor, Neil Mahajan.

Date: Monday, June 15.
Time: 11:00 AM – 2 PM.
Location: Altitude Accelerator Office (Brampton).

Deadline to apply: Friday, September 19 at 1:00 PM.

How to Participate: Spots are limited! Please complete this short form to request a meeting slot: Submit Interest Here.

InsurePlus by Guthrie Insurance will provide timely office hours for founders seeking to inquire about their services.

About: Guthrie Insurance has been around 40+ years. It is part of Navacord, the second-largest independent brokerage in Canada. $7.2 billion in gross written premiums, with over 75,000 commercial clients. Their focus is on technology companies, life sciences, and scaling companies.

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Welcome Our Summer Students to Altitude Accelerator

altaccelerator — Tue, 26 May 2026 23:03:53 +0000

By Shanya Samuel

Every summer, Altitude Accelerator has the privilege of welcoming emerging talent into our organization, and this year is no exception. We’re thrilled to introduce three new team members who each bring a unique background, a passion for community, and a drive to make an impact. Meet Tireni, Shanya, and Ashwin.

Tireni Babs-Olorunfemi, Environmental Program Coordinator

Tireni is a Bachelor of Commerce student at the University of Toronto, joining Altitude with a strong record of student leadership, community advocacy, and equity-focused programming. As Racialized Student Coordinator at the UTM Students’ Union, he managed programming that engaged over 800 students during Black History Month and helped establish a Racialized Coalition to amplify student voices on campus. As Co-President of the African Student Association, he has led large-scale collaborative initiatives, built networking opportunities for students, and developed operational systems to support his team. He also mentors youth through Big Brothers Big Sisters.

At Altitude, Tireni is excited to deepen his understanding of innovation ecosystems, build meaningful connections, and bring his passion for community and collaboration into a new space.

Shanya Samuel, Digital Marketing Specialist

Shanya is a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) student in Economics at Queen’s University, joining Altitude with a background spanning student governance, social advocacy, and corporate operations, all shaped by a commitment to creating more equitable opportunities for underrepresented communities. She served as a Student Senator for the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, completed a Corporate Lending Operations internship at TD Securities, and collaborated through SHAD Canada on developing an app designed to support newcomers to Canada. She has also been mentored by Dragon’s Den investor Wes Hall and former MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes.

At Altitude, Shanya is looking forward to contributing through storytelling and digital engagement, helping amplify the work of the founders and investors in the ecosystem while deepening her understanding of how ideas become impactful ventures.

Ashwin Sasidharan, Environmental Impact Analyst

Ashwin is a third-year Finance student at Toronto Metropolitan University joining Altitude with a strong analytical foundation and a growing interest in the intersection of sustainability and business strategy. He is well-positioned to evaluate and communicate the environmental dimensions of the ventures Altitude supports.

At Altitude, Ashwin is looking forward to engaging with a diverse portfolio of startups, building meaningful relationships with founders, and developing a professional profile that bridges environmental insight with commercial strategy. He sees this experience as a pivotal step toward a future in finance, consulting, or banking, and is excited to contribute to the conversations shaping the next generation of purpose-driven innovation.

Welcome to the team, Tireni, Shanya, and Ashwin! We’re excited to see the impact you’ll make this summer.

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An Investor Perspective: What Are the Traits that Make Startups Attractive and Investable?

altaccelerator — Mon, 25 May 2026 18:22:34 +0000

By Hessie Jones

For founders, raising capital is not about just pitching. The process goes far deeper and takes time. It means outreach, building relationships, and really tapping into what investors want.

A recent fireside chat hosted by Brampton Venture Zone, welcomed Nick Kuryluk, Cofounder of Cosality, Altitude Angels Investor and Holly Gardner, Founder of SoCitty — both Altitude Accelerator Co-Chairs to discuss the investor perspective, and how startup organizations should position themselves for funding.

Nick Kuryluk’s background is in the biotech and biopharmaceutical sector. Having worked in Amgen, a large biotech for more than 22 years, he helped launched and commercialize new products in Canada and globally. He was also a founder, CEO and investor of Cold Block Technologies, a laboratory instrument manufactory startup which is now selling their products globally.

Kuryluk talks about the investor ‘s mindset, which, for him, has been influenced by his peers, and his own experience engaging with early-stage companies. He says that technology alone is not enough, adding

“The success of launching an early stage company is largely based on exceptional vision of a leader, of an organization, who surrounds themselves with a solid board and advisors who can put together a management team that has demonstrated abilities to execute operational plans, because in this world right now, it’s all about execution, and who can demonstrate traction, customer validation, and the ability to raise capital.”

Altitude Accelerator and Altitude Angels, he emphasizes, having fantastic mentorship programs to help early-stage companies become investor-reaaving fantastic mentorship programs to help early-stage companies become investor-ready, and access an engaged ecosystem network to help them explore pathways for growth and capital.

Where Founders May Fall Short

Gardner indicated there was no magic recipe to capital that founders can ascribe to. Many will learn from mistakes. Kuryluk has reviewed hundreds of pitch decks from companies ready to raise capital. Here are some of his observations:

Quite often, what is missing is the business element. Founders can improve connecting the dots between a solid business model designed for launching a product globally and how it dovetails to the revenue streams —demonstrating the unit economics of those revenue streams.

Questions they should ask: What is the cost of acquiring a customer? What is the lifetime value of that customer?

When it comes to the financial operations, how well is the founder at managing cash? Burn rate is critical. Companies that manage this early on are set up for long-term success.

Investors want to see a defensible moat. Can the big competitors copy what you’re doing?

Investors will heavily weigh the quality of the leader and the management team in being able to demonstrate they can execute. “Execution is king,” he emphasizes, “The bottom line is that investors are placing a bet on you and they want to know they can trust you with their money.”

Optics are Important: How and When Founders Present Themselves is Key

Gardner argues that while there is an expectation for a polished presentation and a solid answer to every question, transparency also plays a role in building trust with investors.

Founders will not always have all the answers for every question, but Kuryluk argues

“Being honest about what you know, what you don’t know—but more importantly what you’re doing about it such as identifying those market, regulatory, management or technological risks— demonstrates growth, honesty and, that you are the kind of leader we want to invest in.”

Gardner adds,

“Investors’ conversations with founders are part of the vetting process. If you can show good judgement, and you can navigate decisions effectively, and listen to feedback, this is an important part of building trust.”

Kuryluk’s advice, as a former CEO of an early-stage company, is to start earlier in reaching out to investors before you need the money and let them know where you are today. As a founder moves from series A and along the continuum, they will have already laid the groundwork for that later discussion, building awareness of your organization and educating investors on how your solution is are addressing problems. He emphasizes,

“In Ontario, the investment community is small and connected. The cross-linkages with members who also participate in other investment groups in peel, Toronto, Niagara Falls etc. can be leveraged to grow awareness and investment opportunities.”

What are the Most Important Factors for Any Founder Pitch?

Kuryluk immediately pointed to traction and customer validation as he states,

“We have a disciplined process for founder pitches to angel investors. We have a screening committee, which meets with founders, reviews the pitch deck. I like to call it a pre-pitch. From there a decision is made whether that founder moves on towards a pitch presentation. That will be followed by a due diligence session with interested investors. In that screening process we look for the quality of the CEO, the ability of the operational team to execute—we look for that demonstrated success. For all founder pitches, traction and customer validation are the most important elements we look for.”

How is this demonstrated at the pre-revenue stages? He indicates that key opinion leader endorsements, letters of intent from future customers, and pilot participants are great indications of traction. He adds that partnerships and organizations you are working with to launch your products are important. This is a high hurdle that many investors screen for, and it needs to be emphasized.

Gardner also added that in the earlier stages if you can demonstrate you’ve done deep dives into customer discovery and took away some key learnings from it that helps validate customer need then it shows investors there is movement towards a solution fit for market.

Traction = movement = improvement.

Kuryluk says, investors want companies they’ve invested in to show in the time they last spoke that there is progress in partner relationship, customer growth, adding,

“We may start at a pre-seed stage, then they will come back, and then they will be at a seed stage, and then they will move to a series A stage, a series B stage, and quite often, and we have many examples of Altitude Angels where we have made multiple investments in those organizations that are moving along the commercialization pathway. But those investments won’t happen if you cannot demonstrate the growth in your attraction, the evidence of your customer validation, and demonstrate that your team can consistently execute flawlessly as you move along the commercialization pathway.”

How Important is IP?

Founders at the earliest stages may pursue Intellectual Property (IP) and the costs involved in legal, patent discovery, and filing. They may have limited resources but decide to pursue this as they are growing their company. Kuryluk argues that not all founders in all industries need to pursue IP, stating,

“It depends. I’m highly specialized in med tech and biotech and in these sectors, IP is key. Many investors want to know how defensible the company is, how protected is that asset, what is your picket fence and how well are you protecting that picket fence. But there are other ways to differentiate your product outside of IP.

One of them is a moat. In that space of AI, Kuryluk references an article that creating defensibility is the ability to execute quickly and be the first to market to achieve your beachhead. This “makes it more difficult for someone to throw you off.”

He adds that, outside of IP, in other cases there may be a trade secret like a unique workflow, unmatched to other organizations. Founders must be creative and figure out how they can be untouchable, but also determine their vulnerability to their competitors. His advice,

“Ask yourself, ‘How can I position my organization potentially for a future exit.’ That will determine what you need to do today to reach that goal.”

Bottom Line: Investors Want Value for their Investments

Kuryluk add some important investor insights especially in today’s market:

“Investors are placing high conviction bets. This means they are placing less volume investments and putting more attention on specific companies where there’s a strong conviction to succeed.”
Investors are looking for a clear value inflection logic, adding, “If I am going to invest in your organization, what is the going to be the next major milestone that’s going to increase the valuation of your company?
When you’re pitching to investors, remind yourself, ‘What is their purpose?’ Their purpose is to understand how they’re going to make money? When are they going to make their money back? What will that look like dividends or M&A? They will want to know what the company is valued at today.
In summary, “if you can create the conviction with investors, show the clear value inflection logic, de-risk your product with data, traction, customer validation, demonstrate solid management team execution, and show your path towards an exit, you will have a high likelihood of raising capital.”

Does AI have a Moat these Days?

Many founders capitalizing on general purpose systems can quickly develop products that can be ready for market in less time than before these generative AI systems were introduced. The competition is fierce. Beforehand, the companies who made it to market first had a competitive advantage; today getting to market quickly to garner early feedback before rolling out full product is easier. Is innovation no longer a moat these days especially with advanced AI models?

Kuryluk responded that in his organization, Cosality Executive Partners, which specializes in fractional executives, to help early-stage companies manage their management team gaps, they use customized proprietary AI agents to help augment their human talent. He believes that adopting AI is critical,

“If you’re not working with AI, you’re behind the times. Let’s be fair, we’re not faster than AI, but we’re wiser. And we have a real-world experience of successes and failures and how to navigate them in a kind of environment. But what I do know is that when some of these AI tools are created, it is mind-boggling at how rapid this industry is moving where in 24 hours there will be a better product and smarter product.”

He reiterates the importance of operational excellence; the founder’s ability to execute is part of your moat; how fast can they move… and react to another product coming? More importantly, how sophisticated they are in this AI environment. Investors look at these traits for companies developing AI tools and solutions.

For founders, adapting to the times — economic volatility, technological innovation and the investor mindset — are important considerations for growth and resilience. Demonstrating the ability to marshal through these hurdles and exceeding expectations is the path towards success.

Altitude Accelerator provides founders with resources and tools to accelerate their growth. Check out our Market Readiness programs, for founders ready to go to market, and Investor Readiness, for founders ready to raise capital.

Altitude Accelerator has also developed an AI Readiness Series to provide founders and entrepreneurs with the necessary knowledge in an increasingly AI-embedded world. Contact us info@altitudeaccelerator.ca .

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What Every Startup Founder Needs to Know About Building the Right Team

altaccelerator — Wed, 20 May 2026 15:50:35 +0000

By: Mehr Sokanda

For early-stage founders, few decisions carry more weight than who they choose to build with. The composition of a founding team — and the quality of the hires that follow — shapes not just a company’s trajectory, but its culture, its resilience, and ultimately its odds of survival.

Usha Srinivasan, founder and CEO BReady.ai, has lived the full arc of startup team-building — the wins, the painful lessons, and the clarity that only comes from doing it over and over again.

Discussing her experiences in a recent workshop , she shared key insights on finding co-founders: making your first hires, building culture, and leading through the inevitable chaos of early-stage growth.

Know Why You’re an Entrepreneur in the First Place

Srinivasan opened the session with a perhaps unexpected topic: flow science and the neuroscience of peak performance. She introduced the work of author Steven Kotler, whose research on athletes in flow states — that feeling of effortless, total absorption — she draws a direct line to entrepreneurship.

Her point wasn’t abstract. When you start a business, you’re voluntarily placing yourself in a high-stakes, uncertain environment. And according to flow science, that’s exactly the kind of pressure that triggers dopamine release and drives the compulsive pull of serial entrepreneurship.

“I’m a four-time founder because I get a kick out of it- putting myself in that risky position, making mistakes, getting up again, and so on.”

That self-awareness matters. Understanding why you’re built for this — and acknowledging its psychological weight— is the first step toward leading others well. Because if you don’t understand your own relationship to risk and pressure, you’ll struggle to build a team that can handle it alongside you.

The Co-Founder Question: Go Slow, Ask Everything

For many early-stage founders, the co-founder conversation is treated too casually.

Srinivasan emphasizes that the emotional stakes are that high: “It’s just like a marriage”. The dependency is that real. And just like a marriage, things can unravel quickly if you skip the hard conversations up front.

So what should you actually be talking about? Usha identifies a set of critical questions that most founders avoid until it’s too late:

Avoid yes-people. You don’t want someone who agrees with everything you say. A real co-founder challenges your thinking respectfully. Surrounding yourself with pure validation is comfortable but corrosive.

Align on what success actually looks like. Srinivasan conveyed that her first co-founder for her food-tech startup was a chef who loved experimenting and building. She wanted to scale aggressively toward investment. The result? A slow, grinding mismatch.

“He just loved tinkering with things. I wanted to build something in one year to a certain level… He never had this real goal of building a big, you know, get into pre-seed investment or anything. He didn’t have that goal, and I didn’t ask him.” Six months of weekly meetings and missed deliverables later, the damage was done. So, the takeaway for founders is to not skip this conversation.

Talk about the runway. Can your potential co-founder actually commit? Do they have savings? Are they going to disappear in six months because they can’t afford not to? These aren’t rude questions — they’re essential ones.

Settle disagreements before they happen. How will you handle a deadlock? Who has final say on what? Srinivasan points out that

“Just because you have a 60-40 on your shareholder agreement doesn’t mean decisions are made that way. Sometimes you reach a stalemate, but nobody should have the power to veto you. Make sure you have that conversation before you need it.” Get specific about decision-making authority before you need it.

Put everything in writing. This isn’t optional. As Srinivasan put it, “Have a proper business meeting. Put things in writing. Make sure you have an agreement on the shareholder agreement between the two of you. There’s lots of templates that can be found- Altitude Accelerator can also provide them.”

And when things do go sideways — because they sometimes will — have a neutral intermediary ready. Srinivasan had been in shouting matches with a co-founder. A mentor helped broker the compromise. Having that third party in your back pocket before conflict erupts is far better than scrambling for one mid-crisis.

You Don’t Have to Have a Co-Founder

One of Srinivasan’s most liberating points: co-founders are not mandatory. A lot of founders bring someone on because they can’t afford to pay staff — effectively creating a co-founder out of necessity rather than genuine fit. But there’s a real difference between a co-founder and an employee. “You don’t make a co-founder without them bringing cash, right? You are sharing the burden of the business. Otherwise, they’re just employees.”

If you can run lean and solo, do it until you’re genuinely ready for the right person — not just any available one.

Your First Three Hires: Start with What You Can’t Do

Before you hire anyone, Srinivasan says, ask yourself honestly: what can I do? Because as a solo founder, you’re going to wear multiple hats — ops, sales, marketing, business development — for as long as possible. That’s not a flaw in the system. That’s the system.

Your first hires should fill the genuine gaps, not just feel exciting. Srinivasan runs a not-for-profit AI-enabled talent platform and is not a coder. Tech is her bottleneck, so that’s where she focused. For you, it might be marketing, finance, or program development. The key is honest self-assessment before you spend a single dollar.

But here’s the catch: don’t think in years. Think in 90 days.

“What you need in the next 90 days is not what you need in one year’s time or five years’ time. Ask yourself honestly — is this person needed right now? Because the hire you need today might be a completely different person than the one you’re imagining,” she says.

Startup timelines are compressed. Someone who would be transformative in year two might actually be dead weight — or simply the wrong person — in your current moment. Hire for now. Promote for later.

Common Hiring Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them)

Srinivasan runs through a number of traps she’s seen founders fall into repeatedly — and has fallen into herself.

Letting personality overshadow performance. Have the same structured set of questions for every candidate. Don’t let someone’s charisma in a coffee chat substitute for actual evidence of capability.

“Sometimes it’s the introvert who couldn’t sell themselves in the room who turns out to be your best hire. Don’t let personality overshadow performance — it’s one of the easiest mistakes to make.”

Overvaluing credentials. An MIT or Stanford degree is not a guarantee of hustle, passion, or problem-solving. Srinivasan has seen candidates from community colleges outperform pedigree hires time and again.

“Time and again, the best candidates aren’t always the ones with the most impressive degrees. It could be someone from a community college — what matters is that they understand the work, they’re passionate, they’re curious, and they’re asking the right questions. That’s the person you want.”

Building tech before talking to customers. This one is especially common among technical founders. Srinivasan is on version three of her platform — and versions one and two were only possible because she kept engaging with both talent and employers throughout development.

“Help your customers help you build what you want.”

Ignoring culture fit. Culture fit doesn’t mean hiring people who think exactly like you — in fact, that’s the opposite of what you want. It means hiring people whose working rhythms, communication standards, and professional values align with yours. Startups move fast. If someone has a 48-hour email response time, that’s a culture clash — full stop.

Skipping reference checks. Hire slowly, do your due diligence.

“Don’t take shortcuts. It’s not worth it. I have unfortunately done that and have been burned because of that.”

Passion Over Everything

If there’s one hiring principle Srinivasan returns to more than any other, it’s this: hire people who are genuinely excited about the problem you’re solving.

She tells the story of a team member named Nicole, who worked with her when BReady.ai was incubating at Toronto Metropolitan University. “She would come to me bursting with ideas because she loved the solution so much that she was problem-solving right alongside me. That’s the kind of employee you want — not the one you have to keep chasing.”

Whether it’s a co-founder, a contractor, or your first full-time employee — if they don’t care about what you’re building, you’ll spend more energy managing their indifference than moving your business forward. Don’t settle.

Contracts, Tools, and Protecting Yourself

Srinivasan is practical to the core of operations. A few non-negotiables:

Always use contracts. Even for subcontractors. Include a two-week notice clause — not to be punitive, but to give both parties enough time to transition cleanly. “Make sure everything is legally binding — don’t just email someone a Word document and hope they convert it to a PDF with a typed signature. Do it properly. DocuSign exists for a reason.”

Keep your passwords. Sounds obvious until you lose access to your own social media accounts when someone leaves abruptly.

Use tools wisely, not expensively. Srinivasan’s toolkit includes Pop AI for presentations, Linear for tracking tech build-outs, Buffer and Loomly for social media scheduling, and Midjourney for creative assets. Her advice: try freemium versions of everything before you pay. Ask other entrepreneurs in your community what actually works — not just what’s trending.

Use student talent programs — but interview students like real candidates. Programs like Mitacs and Riipen can offset hiring costs significantly, but you still need to be selective. “Just because they’re paying for it doesn’t mean you have to take it.”

Building an Inclusive Team — and a Culture Worth Showing Up For

Srinivasan is candid that inclusivity isn’t a box to check before your funding pitch. It’s a strategic advantage. Sitting in Toronto — one of the most diverse cities in the world — there is no excuse for a homogeneous team.

Hiring in your own image limits your thinking, your market reach, and your resilience. With tariffs reshaping global trade, Usha notes that SMEs are now coming to her platform urgently looking for candidates with multilingual capabilities and international experience. “You should have been doing that from day one, but anyways, it’s an emergency moment, right?”

Don’t wait for a crisis to value diverse lived experience.

As for culture itself — she builds it intentionally, starting with how she runs meetings. She starts every team gathering with an emotional check-in: she goes first, shares something real, and gives others space to do the same if they want to. The result? People arrive present, not distracted. Tension dissipates. The work gets done better.

She also runs what she calls “good, bad, ugly” reporting in meetings — a format that pushes pessimists to acknowledge what’s working, and optimists to confront what isn’t. It shifts mindsets. It creates psychological safety. It makes people feel less alone.

The Leadership Standard

Srinivasan ended the session with a story that reframes what leadership actually demands. She referenced the famous photograph Vulture and the Little Girl by Kevin Carter — an image that won a Pulitzer Prize, after which Carter took his own life, haunted by the fact that he hadn’t helped the child in the photo.

It’s a visceral example, but her point is precise. Who you are during a crisis is who you are. Not in the planning documents or the pitch decks — in the moments when something goes wrong, when a contractor disappears, when a project collapses, when money is tight and the pressure is crushing. How do you treat your team then?

“The buck stops with me. Wherever I’ve worked, I say, buck stops with me. You made a mistake, we’ll deal with it after. How do you handle it on your own? That’s what leadership is all about.”

That is the standard. Not perfection. Not having all the answers. But showing up with accountability, protecting your team when it counts, and never letting the pressure turn you into someone you don’t want to be.

Building the right team is the hardest and most important thing a founder does. It doesn’t happen by accident, and it doesn’t happen by moving fast. It happens through honest self-assessment, deliberate conversations, strong contracts, inclusive instincts — and the courage to keep hiring for passion over convenience, every single time.

At Altitude Accelerator, we are always looking for innovative ideas. If you are a startup founder seeking funding, expertise, and mentorship—and your business is ready for its next phase, please contact us info@altitudeaccelerator.ca or review our programs here.

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Altitude Accelerator is excited to welcome Richard Nonso as our new Marketing and Communications Associate!

altaccelerator — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 20:49:58 +0000

Richard is currently pursuing his Master of Management of Innovation at the University of Toronto, building on a background in Applied Computing and Economics. His interests sit at the intersection of technology, entrepreneurship, and community building, particularly in creating pathways for others to access opportunities in tech.

His journey into innovation was shaped during his time at the University of Windsor’s entrepreneurship centre, where he worked closely with founders, supported programming, and helped deliver initiatives introducing students to startup methodologies like design thinking and Lean Startup. Being immersed in that environment sparked a deeper curiosity, not just about building technology, but about how ideas evolve into ventures that create real impact.

That curiosity, combined with his own experience navigating the tech space as a newcomer and underrepresented student, led him to co-found MyPath2Tech, a youth-focused initiative helping students explore careers in technology. Through hands-on programming, mentorship, and industry exposure, the initiative has supported nearly 200 students and secured over $200,000 in funding to expand its reach.

Richard has also gained experience across product, strategy, and operations through roles in product management, business analysis, and banking operations. Across these experiences, a common thread has been his ability to connect people, ideas, and resources to move initiatives forward.

At Altitude, Richard is excited to contribute to the region’s innovation ecosystem by supporting startups, amplifying their stories, and helping build stronger connections across the community.

We’re thrilled to have him on the team. Welcome, Richard!

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Have General Purpose Models Changed the Rules for Startup Investment?

altaccelerator — Tue, 14 Apr 2026 12:42:31 +0000

By Hessie Jones

Large Language Models (LLMs), since their introduction three years ago, have upended how software is developed. Vibe coding is here, and anyone with a good idea now can build solutions from prompts and create a working prototype in days, not months.

Pre-LLMs, the moat was the algorithm. Companies would spend years building their custom models from curated datasets and hardening model efficacy over time as behavioral data increased. This has been the secret sauce—the key that defined product market fit and made them highly investable.

We’ve entered a stage of commoditized intelligence, general-purpose models courtesy of big frontier labs, OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini and Deepseek. For companies integrating these more advanced AI applications, they will need to rethink how to leverage these LLMs to not only create a competitive edge but also to sustain their business.

In a recent AI Readiness webinar with Abigail Dubiniecki, Data Privacy Strategist and Consultant, she offered that the “shiny new object is no more” and that investors are less impressed by simple wrappers around large language models adding,

“As startups integrate large language models… many founders are realizing that technical feasibility is not the primary constraint. The deeper constraint is whether what they are building is legally permissible, socially acceptable, and commercially defensible… know what you are building, the risks it creates, and the responsibilities you cannot delegate. “

We reached out to our network of seasoned investors and advisors who have seen the evolution from narrow AI to generative AI models. They share their thoughts on what has changed this time around and how they’re evaluating new innovations in this nascent environment.

Shambhavi Mishra is an Associate Partner at Antler, a global venture capital organization investing in early-stage AI-native software companies across Saas, fintech, climate and infrastructure-adjacent technologies. In a recent post, she agreed that those who build generative AI wrappers will “struggle,” and adds,

“We are entering a reset phase, and the noisy layers will shake out, the real infrastructure will solidify, and GenAI will start to feel less experimental and more like basic operating infrastructure. Antler is focused on disciplined capital allocation and back companies that can build efficiently and sustainably.”

Mishra predicts that those with data moats in cybersecurity, compliance, defense and infrastructure will fare better.

William Ma is the Senior Director of Investments at MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund. He says this,

“AI has lowered the barrier to entry, so early traction isn’t a strong signal anymore. When everyone looks good at the start, we focus on teams that can turn an initial wedge into something durable and have the pace to adapt as the market evolves.”

When asked whether investors want more visibility to the current issues like copyright, or compliance impediments that have been the byproduct of these LLMs, Ma noted,

“It’s not a binary shift. It’s more about whether founders have a clear view of how their business will evolve, including the risks they’re taking on. For example, you might build an AI voice agent today, but competition will intensify, and switching costs will likely decline over time. The key question is how you build durability, whether through deeper workflow integrations, proprietary data, or other forms of compounding defensibility.”

Stephen Beney is the Principal at Smart & Biggar, Canada’s leading legal firm dedicated to intellectual property. Gurbir Sidhu is a Patent Lawyer, also with Smart & Biggar. As lawyers who evaluate AI startups, they agree they are shifting their approach as Beney adds,

“Traditionally, value in AI companies flowed from narrow, proprietary algorithms and specialized models. Today, with intelligence models increasingly commoditized, investors are asking a different question: What part of this business will still hold value when the underlying models can be swapped out?”

Gurbir adds that from an intellectual property (IP) perspective the analysis generally falls into two categories: IP Value and IP Risk:

IP Value

“As models become easier to replace, the strongest indicator of defensibility is often not the base model itself. Instead, investors look for whether the company has built a durable moat around the model.”

He emphasizes that a company may hold meaningful value even when using replaceable models if it possesses:

(a) Exclusive or hard-to-replicate training or retrieval data

(b) Defensible data labeling

(d) Strong safety, reliability, and evaluation benchmarking

(e) Demonstrated performance advantages under real-world constraints (latency, cost per task, failure rates) built over known models

For startups building in-house models, investors will inquire whether models will deliver superior economics, reliability or outcomes, with Beney adding,

“Are these advantages difficult for competitors to copy? Patents can help, especially when they map clearly to product value, but in many AI businesses, a layered IP strategy trade secrets, contracts, copyrights, and data rights tend to be more practically valuable than a thin patent portfolio.”

Gurbir introduces the second category:

IP Risk

“AI-first companies also face distinctive IP-related risks, and investors increasingly test how seriously teams manage them. The primary issue is data provenance and IP infringement.” He adds, a company developing its own models should be able to explain:

(a) What data it trained on

(b) What was licensed

(d) What mechanisms exist for deletion, anonymization, opt-outs, access control, and restricted use

(e) How it addresses risks of IP infringement in the output from its models

Other key IP risks they site? Gurbir adds,

“Open-source license compliance, copyright exposure from training and retrieval workflows, risks of model memorization or extraction, and application‑layer vulnerabilities such as prompt injection and data leakage.

Regulators are also moving toward more explicit expectations around copyright, transparency, explainability, lack of bias, governance, and secure deployment.”

Beney suggests that from narrow AI to general-purpose models there is now broader shift in defensibility,

“In traditional narrow AI, defensibility often comes from a specialized model or proprietary algorithm built for a tightly scoped task. In the LLM era, base intelligence increasingly resembles a purchased input, usually accessed through an API rather than built in-house. While the shift reduces the burden of model training, it introduces dependence on third‑party providers and weakens any moat that relies solely on prompting or a thin integration layer.”

The strongest LLM-era startups operating on commoditized models therefore build defensibility elsewhere, such as, through system design, proprietary data advantages, secure and reliable deployment, workflow ownership, and disciplined IP risk management. When these components are in place, the commoditization of base models does not erode value. In fact, it can amplify the value.”

Zeeshan Ali, Partner at Wittington Ventures echoes this for other sectors such as climate and healthcare, where “…defensibility isn’t IP or data alone. It comes from translating models into real-world systems where constraints, regulation, and feedback loops compound advantage.”

Shambhavi Mishra, from Antler, advises that playbooks are being rewritten and adding that it has been difficult to keep up with the pace of this tech acceleration, but also asserts that fundamentals must be there. She states the importance on the ‘depth of workflow, not just intelligence’:

“The bar is no longer ‘we use AI.’ What matters is whether your product becomes deeply embedded in a customer’s workflow and is hard to replace. Distribution and integration are stronger moats than the model itself.”

Real usage and outcomes, not just early revenue, she argues, are key: “

In AI, early revenue can be misleading. We look for signals like repeat usage, retention, and whether the product is driving meaningful outcomes (time saved, revenue generated, decisions improved).”

Giselle Melo, Altitude Accelerator, Entrepreneur-in-Residence and Managing Director at MATR Ventures, doesn’t stray for the variables that investors use today, and contends revenue is a point of validation, explaining that while proprietary tech and IP are critical to “asset value,”

“We [as investors] place significant weight on tangible commercialization. Secure active paid pilots or early contracts to prove product market fit. Real-world revenue signals carry more weight than theoretical potential, especially when assessing applied or native AI companies.”

Mishra shares that companies must build towards a sustainable system—not a feature,

“Many AI products today risk being point solutions or are just solving for a feature. The companies that stand out are those that are evolving into a broader system or platform within their category, something that compounds over time. For example, an AI tool that starts with automating one step in a workflow (e.g., summarizing calls) becomes much more valuable when it evolves into a system that captures all customer interactions, generates insights, and informs decision-making across teams.”

Melo, from MATR Ventures, reminds the company’s TEAM is the biggest differentiator for investors,

“In an era where core algorithms are increasingly commoditized, we invest in founders first —more than ever. Be prepared to articulate not just what you are building, but why your team is uniquely qualified to build this company. Demonstrate your perseverance, domain expertise, and ability to execute—because in a crowded market, execution and the ability to identify where your growth is coming from are the true moats.”

And in an environment that currently demonstrates an increasing fragmentation because of political headwinds, Melo reasons that startups must think globally from day one, especially outside of North America,

“Show us that you understand opportunities to scale internationally and that you are open to leveraging our advisor network to mitigate risk and accelerate growth. A global mindset signals an awareness of the importance to navigate complex, evolving markets and globes shifting power structures.”

If you are a founder and looking for AI guidance to evolve your business, please check out our AI Resources Page for insights, videos on Building with Agentic Agents and AI-Powered coding and more…

Altitude Accelerator offers startup founders one path to scaling their business. We offer targeted programs based on the stage of your business. Whether you’re looking to bring your MVP to market, commercialize, or do your first capital raise, visit our program page to accelerate your growth. If you are currently raising, please start your application at Altitude Angels.

The post Have General Purpose Models Changed the Rules for Startup Investment? appeared first on Altitude Accelerator.

Canada’s Aggressive Defense Industrial Strategy is Also an Economic Strategy

altaccelerator — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 18:50:35 +0000

By Hessie Jones

This $81.8 billion defence budget is based on “fully indigenous Canada’s capabilities, Canada’s know-how, Canada’s needs and Canada’s growing potential.”

I attended a breakfast on St. Patrick’s Day, featuring the Honourable David McGuinty, Canada’s Minister of National Defence.

In recent months, the tone from our Prime Minister and his office has been different. It’s been more defiant, more bold and confident. Canada has always been the quiet one, the reliable one, but it has always taken a back seat to the more dominant political players. But we’ve rested on our laurels. We’ve become complacent. Because of our steadfast partner to the south, we’ve become dependent.

But no more.

This was not a typical speech from an official. It was a rally to ignite a fervour long in the making. I could sense it from McGuinty’s posture, his tone, and the way the audience received his message.

He introduced Canada’s first Defence Industrial Strategy (DIS). As the Brampton Board of Trade, CEO Jaipaul Massey Singh explained,

“It’s not just about a defence policy; it’s actually an economic strategy. And unlocking that significant federal investment in full-use technologies and development capacity, these opportunities that extend well beyond traditional defence and into separate manufacturing, AI, logistics, cybersecurity, and more are really unique opportunities for us.”

(What does this mean for startups and SMBs regionally, in Ontario and Canada? Please refer to the resources listed at the end of this article for more information.)

McGuinty declared,

“We need to rethink how we approach defence. We made a deliberate decision to meet this moment, and we invested over $80 billion to rebuild, to re-arm and to reinvest in our Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). This is a big decision. It’s a commitment backed by a funding package worth $81.8 billion over five years.”

There are an estimated 100,000 Canadians who serve in the armed forces, and McGuinty declared they are an “important piece of the puzzle.”

Thousands of CAF members are deployed across the globe… as part of NATO Multinational Brigade in Latvia, commanded by Canada… providing training for Ukraine’s armed forces through Operation Unifier… training alongside regional partners in the Indo-Pacific… and deployed, at a moment’s notice, when natural disasters strike in Canadian communities.

He elevated the work and dedication of the armed forces members:

That’s a lot of responsibility. A career in uniform is like no other job. It’s immensely rewarding and comes with its own unique challenges. When you’re in the CAF, there’s no refusing dangerous work. There’s no collective bargaining. There’s no compensatory time off. When you’re asked to do something, you do it even if it comes at a great personal cost to you, your spouse or your family.

For the first time in nearly three decades, he announced a “hard-earned pay raise” from 8% – 20% with targeted allowances for in-demand trades like signal operators, combat medics and naval communicators and additional support for operational deployments.”

The increased spending supporting CAF also means:

7500 affordable housing units for CAF and their families

upgrading bases, armouries across the country, creating work for thousands of tradespeople to the tune of $960 million: masons, HVAC technicians, roofers, electricians, framers, architects, designers, carpet suppliers, to name a few.

modernizing equipment, including new River-Class Destroyers, up to a dozen new submarines, over 140 new aircraft on order, armoured combat support and light armoured vehicles, and 24 new coast guard ice breakers on the way. He declared,

“We have the second-largest fleet of icebreakers in the world, and we’re going to need them with respect to our Arctic responsibilities.

“We have to deliver our capabilities faster.”

McGuinty declared that the global challenges at this scale have not been seen since WWII and that this is Canada’s call to build momentum.

He called out the necessary nexus between the CAF and the industrial base, and the need to recognize they are “conjoined” — key to unlocking Canada’s full potential for the defence sector.

This also means strengthening Canada’s broader economy—especially now, because of tariffs, rising unemployment, and inflation.

In developing the Defence Industrial Strategy (DIS), it rested on things that were unique to Canada:

What do we need?

What are we good at building?

What can we design?

What can we give rise to?

What can we sell abroad?

How does this manifest in broader industrial capabilities?

Ontario’s defence sector contributes to critical capabilities across the land, air, and digital domains. This includes advanced sensors, electronics, military vehicles, aerospace systems, avionics, and beyond.

McGuinty noted the “deliberate” expansion for innovation in emerging areas such as AI, and pointed to our strength in emerging quantum technologies and advanced computing, “where we’re even stronger.” Canada, he noted, is considered the second-most prominent player in cryptography, a role that will be key as military advancements play out.

Government Procurement Will No Longer Be a Bottleneck: The Mandate to Build, Partner and Buy

McGuinty noted they are modernizing their approach to procurement.

Going forward, they’ve created a new agency to handle contracts of $100 million or more, including the purchase of submarines, the largest single procurement Canada has ever undertaken. As McGuinty explains,

We’re looking to build, we’re looking to partner, and then we’re looking to buy… in that order

This means partnering with trusted allies, multinational firms, to jointly develop capabilities and open new markets. The goal is to create an ecosystem that generates jobs and supplies goods and services as inputs, not only to the military or navy but across Canada’s industry.

This also means creating economic opportunities for Canadian companies that have secured U.S. military contracts. He recalls a discussion with a company in Quebec,

I told a company in Quebec, 9 employees, one of the top companies in this country in radar technology. I asked them, ‘How are the sales going with the Canadian government?’ The owner said, ‘I haven’t had a single sale. 92% of my sales are to the Pentagon.’ I said, ‘That’s good. How do we get you from 9 employees to 30?’

In Partnering with Trusted Allies and Multinational Firms: “We are Very Demanding Now…”

McGuinty is clear that in negotiating with our allies, he is adamant that there be industrial benefits to Canada in the form of jobs, resource inputs like Canadian steel or aluminum. He says,

I regularly sit across the table from ministers of defence, and I have a really good, productive meeting, and then I slide a sheet of paper across the table and say, ‘Now I want to talk to you about these six outstanding contracts for our six countries. How well are we doing, and how can we land these?’

And I’m shameless about it. Because we need to be shameless about this, because we have the talent and we have to be a little bit more forward-leaning, maybe even a lot more.

He announced Canada signed on to the Security Action for Europe (SAFE) Program, noting that Canada was the only non-European Union country admitted to the deal. What does it mean? Canada has access to EU lending and borrowing totalling 150 billion, which will then be able to procure materials from Canada. As McGuinty emphasizes,

We’re in the tent. We get to sell in that tent. By the way, Germany and other European Union members fought hard for Canada to be part of this because they see Canada as a foothold in North America and a trustworthy partner.

“We Are a Country that Says What it Means and Means What it Says.”

McGuinty joked that this is not the case everywhere, “if you know what I’m saying.” Today, business is predicated on trust, which is an important signal, and this has made it possible for Prime Minister Mark Carney to secure important global relationships and strike deals:

In India, Australia and Japan, meeting with leaders to strengthen relationships in the region and invest in Canada to produce more defence material

In the last eight months, six new defence agreements have been signed

In six months, 12 new trade and defence agreements were signed

Two days ago, successful meetings with Arctic countries in the Nordic region

Canada’s space capabilities will become a key area of investment. McGuinty highlights that 20% of Canada’s economy depends on satellites: for cell phones, energy grids, logistics, deliveries, and satellite relay. In a $2 trillion industry, there is strong demand for launching satellites into space. In Europe, Norway’s only launch pad is heavily backlogged. The announcement to build up to six new launch pads in Nova Scotia has been met with enthusiasm. As per McGuinty,

When I told my German counterpart about this, he asked, “How fast can you get that built? We don’t want to launch anymore from a particular American location.’

We have to make sure that we have our own sovereign capabilities, are not dependent on others, and are not made vulnerable as a result of others trying to cut off access to those satellites, or worse, mess with the satellites already in space.

The Defence Minister pointed to the expected return for this strategy over the next 10 years:

125,000 new jobs across Canada

Defence revenues increase by more than 240%. Current revenues $14billion annually

Defence exports increase by 50%

Raise the share of defence contracts for Canadian firms to 70%

Boost government in-defence-related R&D by 85%

Canadian universities will serve as a pipeline for STEM talent to develop the skilled workforce necessary in the coming decade. He aptly phrased it this way: “We need our universities and colleges at their best to provide the feederstock of human capital.”

“National Security and Economic Security Have Always been Two Sides of the Same Coin.”

McGuinty admitted, however, that there has never been a formal acknowledgement of this. Canadian businesses will be a vital partner in upholding safety and sovereignty. The benefits of DIS will unlock the full potential of the government’s relationship with business, which will be readily felt across the economy.

But on the military side, McGuinty admitted,

We need to get our mojo back. We need to get our groove back. After the Second World War, we were the third-largest air force in the world. We were the fourth-largest navy in the world. Think about that. Our companies are global leaders in aerospace, communications technologies and advanced research. We’re not starting from scratch.

Canada has the ingredients. We have water. We have steel and aluminum. We’ve got space. We’ve got critical minerals — 11 of the 12 NATO-defined critical minerals are on Canadian soil, as McGuinty pointed out.

“We continue to dance with our American Neighbours… We’ve moved from a Tango to a Waltz”

McGuinty said that 75 cents of every dollar we spend goes toward procuring military supplies for the United States. He said,

“That’s been our tradition. We’ve been integrated that way. We will continue to purchase from the United States. That’s a fact of life. They’re very good at what they do and have a lot of investments in this country. We are connected. Our defence sectors are connected. This is a great privilege and one we’re trying to maintain, and I think we will. But we’re going to diversify. And we’re going to continue to, as I say, dance with our American neighbours. It’s just that we move from a tango to a Waltz.”

As a sovereign nation, we are making sovereign decisions.

He noted that Canada is not planning to stop.

We are more overt now, more public, and more forward-facing about the link between our Defence Industrial Sector and our defence needs…

One of the biggest drivers of the strategic shift has been NATO’s 2% of GDP military spending target. It will be reached by March 31st. It’s the first time in history. And we’re going to be moving forward with 3.5% and then 5% by 2035.

He emphasized that Canadians can’t be naive. We have to respond to a changing threat landscape. As McGuinty shared, Prime Minister Carney is always two steps ahead. It’s not a knee-jerk reaction. It’s a measured plan to build not only for sovereignty, but for Canadian economic resilience.

Resource and Funding Opportunities for Canadian Companies

For regional startups and SMBs in the province of Ontario the following funding and resource opportunities are available:

Business Development Bank (BDC) recently announced the new Defence Platform that will provide $4 billion in financing, advice and investment solutions to help businesses supporting Canadian companies working in defence and national security. This is subdivided into:

- $3.5 billion in financing and advisory services to help Canadian businesses scale and “participate in the value chains of defence contracts and national projects focused on sovereignty.”

- $500 million in investments to strengthen broader innovation ecosystem through:

- - Strong North Fund – a new venture capital fund focused on deep technologies and dual use applications

- - Catalyst Innovation Fund – innovation catalyst for the startup ecosystem

- More information about BDC here.

The Economic Development Corporation (EDC) provides financial solutions, risk management and market knowledge to help Canadian companies scale and compete globally.

- Newly launched February 2026, this organization will consider support for projects that increase Canada’s domestic defence and security capabilities including:

- - Cybersecurity

- - Drones

- - Munitions

- - Critical Minerals

- - Quantum computing

- - Artificial Intelligence

- - Land Vehicles

- More information about EDC here

FedDev Ontario has initiated funding for projects that “drive innovation and business growth” in the defence sector, with the goal to allocate $200 million as part of the Regional Defence Investment Initiative (RDII). Note: applications are now closed as of January 21, 2026.

- FedDev Ontario’s allocating $200 million in defence support to target businesses seeking to enter or grow within defence supply chains. Note: applications are now closed for this as of January 21, 2026

- FedDev Ontario funding – Please refer to other funding opportunities here.

Brampton Tariff Resource Hub – launched by InvestBrampton, this provides the latest updates on trade developments, sector and funding opportunities for Brampton companies to remain competitive. Funding opportunities up to $50k through the CanExport SMEs program

- More information on the Brampton Tariff Resource Hub here

- More information on CanExport SMEs

Ontario Government-Led ICT Export Missions to Europe: AI, Cybersecurity, Semiconductor Electronics and Telecom – Canadian companies are invited to participate in Ontario-led and supported missions to priority international markets.

- Ontario AI & Big Data – Paris, France, September 14-18

- - More info

- Ontario Semiconductor and Electronics – Electronica 2026 in Munich Germany – November 5-13, 2026

- - More info

- Ontario Cyber & Digital Trust – ISF Congress 2026, Milan, Italy, November 14-17, 2026

- - More info

- Ontario ICT Export Business Mission to Mobile World congress 2027, Barcelona, Spain, March 1-4, 2027

- - More info

To learn more about the funding opportunities as part of the Defence Industrial Strategy please visit: BDC Defence Platform, and The Economic Development Corporation (EDC)

The post Canada’s Aggressive Defense Industrial Strategy is Also an Economic Strategy appeared first on Altitude Accelerator.

Master of Management of Innovation Opportunity

altaccelerator — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 21:49:06 +0000

Looking for innovative, business-savvy talent to accelerate your company’s growth this summer?

The MMI Master of Management of Innovation – University of Toronto program connects you with top-tier graduate students who combine scientific knowledge with business acumen. Their students come from diverse backgrounds in science, engineering and technology and are trained in management, strategy, finance, marketing, big data analytics and commercialization—skills essential for scaling innovation.

Each summer, MMI students complete a mandatory internship, making this the perfect opportunity to bring fresh ideas and energy to your organization. They’re eager to apply their knowledge to real-world challenges in biotechnology, healthcare, pharma, and beyond, helping you tackle projects in:

Market research & commercialization strategy
Business development & partnership building
Product management & user experience
Project management & operations
Data analysis & research support

They partner with more than 100+ employers annually on events and experiential learning opportunities and support students and employers at all stages of career exploration and job creation.

Why partner with them?
End-to-end support: We assist with job creation, candidate screening, and funding options.
Dual skillset: Students blend technical know-how with business strategy—ideal for startups.
Proven success: Over 70% of employers retain MMI interns for full-time roles.

Ready to strengthen your team with talent that understands both science and business? Connect with Afrodite Cruz, Recruitment, Placement & Employer Relations Manager, at afrodite.cruz@utoronto.ca to learn how MMI students can help you connect with students who have the skills and experience you are looking for. Summer placements are starting in May so don’t miss out!

The post Master of Management of Innovation Opportunity appeared first on Altitude Accelerator.

A Founder’s Quest for Better Answers in Clean Energy

altaccelerator — Fri, 27 Mar 2026 15:33:39 +0000

By Ishpreet Khanuja

It is easy to think that a founder’s journey begins with a great solution. An entrepreneur has a novel, unique answer to a popular enough question, and then embarks on a journey to make that answer available to the masses. But what happens when a researcher sets out on that path — someone who thinks asking the right questions is just as important as finding the answers?

In 2023, a team of engineering students at the University of Toronto founded Serenity Power with the mission to create compact and sustainable power solutions for grid resilience using a new fuel cell design. Yifei Yan, Yvonne Liu and Aleisha Cerny, Cofounders of Serenity Power are on a mission to accelerate clean energy transition.

In our recent conversation with CEO Aleisha Cerny, she shares how her team’s inclination to sit with complexity and follow lines of inquiry beyond what was required began long before their path to entrepreneurship.

Her inspiring story, from engineering student to budding founder, offered valuable insights on how deeply technical builders often arrive at entrepreneurship gradually, carrying their questions with them until action becomes unavoidable.

The Origin Story

Cerny’s interest in clean technology began during her engineering studies, where she was fascinated by the idea that math, science, and engineering could be applied to climate action in practical ways. Her interest later sharpened during a research internship in Germany, where she joined a hydrogen and fuel cell division at a solar research institute.

Seeing fuel cells used innovatively on campus, through hydrogen-powered vehicles and fueling stations that produced water as their only byproduct, reframed her understanding of clean energy beyond theory, within real systems and with real constraints.

In 2021, Cerny began her master’s degree at the University of Toronto, where she encountered fuel cell technology again in the classroom. The course introduced her to solid oxide fuel cells and their ability to operate on multiple fuels, including natural gas and hydrogen. To Cerny, the technology seemed to offer a unique way to reduce emissions without waiting for a fully built hydrogen economy.

It was also through this course that she met Liu, co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, initially through Zoom lectures and later through shared lab space. They were the students who stayed after class to ask questions, who went to teaching assistants with exam problems, who compared notes on research directions. Over time, those conversations extended beyond coursework.

Stepping Stones

Shortly after graduating, Cerny joined Yvonne and Yifei Yan (Chief Technology Officer) in an incubator at the University of Toronto. Their desire to work on fuel cells in a way that could make a tangible difference led them to design a fuel cell solution for Class 8 trucks, motivated by the environmental and health costs of diesel-powered freight. They developed a business plan and worked through early technical assumptions, even reaching the milestone of signing an NDA with Volvo in Sweden to explore a potential study.

Confident in the direction, they began fundraising, reaching out to roughly a thousand investors and securing close to 70 callbacks. “We heard a lot of ‘no’s early on, often just from reviewing the deck,” shared Cerny. “We learned that because transportation carries lower margins and much longer timelines, commercialization can take close to ten years, and many investors are working within five-to-seven-year funding cycles.”

By November 2024, the team started to sense a pivot on the horizon for Serenity.

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

Their outreach led to an exciting invitation from one of the investors they had contacted, who encouraged the team to spend time in a New York-based hard-tech incubator. Over the coming months, Cerny and her co-founder spoke with dozens of organizations across mining, construction, oil and gas, healthcare and media. They asked important questions on how power was currently generated, where diesel was still relied upon and what pressures companies were facing around emissions and operating costs.

Through these brainstorming sessions, oil and gas started to emerge as a consistent theme over time. Many operations were remote and off-grid, diesel generators were common, and monitoring and sensing infrastructure required constant power. At the same time, companies were under increasing pressure to reduce emissions, particularly methane.

The team also looked at their own assumptions with a more critical perspective. Building mobility required power outputs in the hundreds of kilowatts and deep integration expertise they did not yet have. Power generation allowed them to start smaller, so they could design systems around 100 watts and deploy them, learning from field data and working toward larger units over time.

Shifting Conversations

Through these energy-focused accelerators and programs, the team connected directly with companies such as CNRL and TC Energy, which selected Serenity to participate in corporate cohorts that allowed the team to enter discussions grounded in operational realities rather than speculation.

In July, Cerny got the opportunity to present at Startupfest with sponsorship support. She pitched across four to five competitions, advancing repeatedly. She shares, “I was pitching back-to-back and moving straight into Q&A each time. I remember looking out at the audience. I was nervous, but people were engaged. They weren’t on their phones. That was the moment I felt that something was resonating.”

The Cost of Commitment

Standing on stage, she realized she was no longer operating as a student or researcher, no longer just on a quest for potential answers but responsible for spearheading the direction of a company. A reframing of identity for a founder comes with a sense of purpose, and as many founders will tell you, also with a unique blend of isolation, sacrifices and uncertainty.

She reflects, “Even when you are surrounded by family or friends, it can be hard to explain what’s actually going on. Much of it isn’t something people can relate to, so you don’t always talk about it. Over time, that can make the journey feel more isolating, simply because it is such a specific experience.” Amidst moving provinces and leaving behind the structure of academic life, what helped Cerny was being part of incubators and accelerators alongside other founders. Shared experiences shortened the learning curve and made the challenges feel less singular.

This guidance can be instrumental in setting realistic expectations for those new to build a hard-tech company at an early stage. Investor diligence often stretches over months, with technical deep dives that end without commitments. Questions around timelines to revenue can feel disconnected from the realities of hardware development, even when two years to initial revenue is considered accelerated by industry standards.

These burdens, Cerny notes, are rarely visible from the outside, but softened in the presence of a community that knows how to build with passion.

Next on The Agenda

Today, the company has three pilot projects under discussion for 2026, including work with a small natural gas producer in Southern Ontario and partners in Alberta and Italy. The pilots focus on deploying smaller systems to gather data and validate performance in the field. As the pilots move closer to execution, the next step will be raising a seed round to support higher-volume production and the development of larger systems, informed by data from early deployments.

Cerny’s vision has also begun to shift toward a longer horizon, where the future of energy is rooted in access, continuity, and responsibility. She realizes the transition to new energy will not happen in isolation, but within communities, across geographies and through innovation within pre-existing systems.

Her conversations with remote and northern communities have been instrumental in informing her big picture perspective. In regions where access to electricity is tied to a single annual shipment of diesel, delays or disruptions can affect heating, water access and basic daily life. These realities shape how Cerny thinks about the role of Serenity Power’s technology within Canada. Compact, dual-fuel systems are not only a technical solution for her, but a way to improve resilience where grid access is limited, and infrastructure expansion is slow.

Serenity Power’s work is not fueled by a desire to disrupt for disruption’s sake. It asks the truly pertinent question of who energy systems are built for and who they leave behind. Shaped by a willingness to work within complexity, their values still insist that access, reliability and equity matter. For founders navigating capital-intensive industries, her story offers an almost rebellious form of innovation, rooted in the belief that meaningful disruption is measured by how widely its benefits are shared.

Like many early-stage founders navigating complex paths to scale, Serenity Power continues to work with experienced advisors through Altitude Accelerator’s Investor Readiness Program, refining their strategy and preparing for future fundraising. Applications to the Investor Readiness Program are currently open for founders building with intention and planning their next stage of growth. Learn more here.

The post A Founder’s Quest for Better Answers in Clean Energy appeared first on Altitude Accelerator.

IP Strategy 101: Designing Safeguards That Scale

altaccelerator — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 16:15:10 +0000

By Ishpreet Khanuja

The fundraising journey is busy enough. As a founder endeavours to secure funding with competing responsibilities, too often their instinct is to treat securing intellectual property (IP) as a mere procedural milestone, turning defining an IP strategy into a performative green flag to secure investor interest. After all, the data does tell a hopeful story.

Small and medium-sized enterprises that hold intellectual property are three times more likely to innovate. Companies with formal IP are 64 per cent more likely to achieve growth, with a clear contrast in revenue generation between businesses that use IP strategically and those that do not.

The question, then, is not whether to file, but how to design an IP strategy that supports scale and intentionally integrates into the architecture of a company. In Altitude Accelerator’s latest IP series, ‘The IP Advantage: Creating Value, Securing Assets & Sustaining Growth’, Smart & Biggar experts Stephen Beney and Shaivi Bhatt met with founders and answered that very question. The engaging session offered an informative deep dive into the foundations of creating a successful IP strategy and equipping it to shape a company that competes well, allocates capital wisely and scales over time.

Intellectual Property as Strategic Infrastructure

“IP is not only a defensive tool that can be used by startups, but also a growth driver,” shares Bhatt. “It pushes innovation forward and it helps startups push boundaries and lead them into success.”

In order to understand your protection strategy, founders must understand the scope of the instruments available at their disposal. Patents, trademarks, copyright and trade secrets are all excellent examples of legal safeguards, but each serves distinct functions.

Patents protect inventions and processes in exchange for public disclosure, acting as negotiated rights at their core.
Trademarks safeguard brand identity and consumer association. In markets where trust and recognition drive adoption, trademarks can be as commercially significant as technical protection.
Copyright attaches automatically to original works such as software code and written materials. It is still surprisingly overlooked in technology ventures, despite being essential to platform businesses and digital products.
Trade secrets protect valuable confidential information that derives its power precisely from remaining undisclosed.

Choosing among these mechanisms requires founders to interrogate where value truly resides within their business. Not every innovation warrants patent protection, nor every internal method a formal registration. An effective IP strategy is one informed by clarity on what differentiates the company and how that differentiation will be defended.

Understand the Risk Landscape

One persistent misconception among early-stage founders is that securing a patent automatically grants them the right to commercialize. While a patent provides the right to exclude others from practicing a defined invention, it does not guarantee that your own product will not infringe upon someone else’s previously established rights.

Freedom to operate is the discipline of assessing whether bringing a product to market would infringe existing intellectual property. It involves reviewing prior filings, overlapping claims and jurisdictional variations to understand where exposure may exist. Especially in saturated markets, particularly those with long histories of innovation, such overlapping protection is highly probable.

Without thorough analysis, a startup may invest in product development only to discover later in the process that a critical feature falls within the scope of an earlier patent. The possibility of redesigning or litigation can result in significant financial and strategic losses. External risk analysis, however, is only one facet of a multidimensional story.

Internal Risk: Ownership, Inventorship and Structural Clarity

In passion-driven early-stage ventures, innovation moves quickly. Between lean teams and overlapping roles, it can be easy to forget that IP does not automatically vest in a company simply because the work was performed within its walls. Without clear documentation and agreements, the company may be inadvertently exposing itself to vulnerabilities that often surface at precisely the moment capital is being raised or an acquisition is underway.

When extended beyond mere symbolic recognition, the legalities of inventorship bring in further complexity. “In principle, the inventors are the first owners, but you have to look at the rights and obligations they have to the entities they work for,” says Beney. When introducing new technical talent into an early-stage venture, founders must consider the knowledge they carry in addition to their prior employment agreements, which may contain non-compete or non-solicitation provisions. If a new hire builds on knowledge that is encumbered, the company may inherit unanticipated exposure.

Internal discipline around ownership and contractual clarity ensures that growth rests on structurally sound assets. Clear employment agreements, confidentiality provisions and invention assignment clauses are some mechanisms that can be used to establish from the outset that innovations developed within the company belong to the company.

Co-Ownership and Joint Development: Complexity by Design

Cultivating the right partnerships can accelerate innovation, but they can also hinder growth if questions around IP are left unanswered. Who owns the resulting IP? Who controls prosecution? Who has the right to enforce? Who can license? Who can sell?

The challenges of collaboration exist well enough on their own, but ownership ambiguity stands to deepen them. Depending on the jurisdiction, a co-owner of a patent may be able to use or license the invention without the consent of the other owner, or unanimous agreement may be required for enforcement. Without a clear mapping of safe legal territory, future fundraising or acquisition discussions can stall as investors attempt to untangle ownership chains and usage rights.

Joint development agreements can therefore benefit significantly from defining in advance how foreground IP will be allocated, how background IP is treated and what rights each party retains. This is more imperative in the case of capital-intensive industries or research-driven ventures, where early prototypes are built in partnership environments. Founders must balance the benefits of shared development with the long-term implications of shared control.

Not a Numbers Game

Legal protection is not a race toward volume. Every filing involves capital, time and strategic attention. Drafting, prosecution and maintenance costs accrue over time, and geographic expansion compounds those commitments.

When filings drift away from commercial reality, they can begin to resemble artifacts rather than infrastructure. Two carefully scoped patents aligned with revenue drivers may offer more defensible ground than a larger collection of loosely connected claims. This coherence also requires periodic reassessment. A company’s direction inevitably evolves as products are refined and markets shift. An IP strategy that remains static while the business changes risks becoming misaligned. Looking at the portfolio through one, three and five-year lenses allows founders to ask whether the protections in place still reflect where the company intends to compete.

Leveraging Government Support as Strategic Leverage

Amidst these many complexities, one aspect of the current landscape can be a cause for optimism. In Canada, government-supported programs have increasingly recognized that early-stage companies require structured support to develop intellectual property strategically.

Ontario’s IPON program, for example, provides funding that can reach six figures annually over a multi-year period, helping companies offset the cost of protection and strategy development. Federally supported initiatives such as Elevate IP have secured renewed funding for the coming years, ensuring continued access to resources for startups seeking to strengthen their positions. IP Assist and related programs also provide targeted support for strategic planning itself, recognizing that effective IP begins with thoughtful design rather than reactive filing.

“You can stack Elevate and IPON funding,” shares Beney. “You just can’t use it for the same thing. For example, if you have a patent application and IPON will only give you a certain amount, and you still need more money for that application, you can’t use Elevate IP for the same thing.”

Building for Endurance

Yes, strategic direction when it comes to IP is important in its ability to guide what comes next. It shapes disclosure decisions, informs collaboration and determines how risk is managed and capital deployed. But it also marks a deeper reflection of a company’s commitment to intentionality. It demands that founders ask where value truly resides, how essential they perceive the potential of said value to be, and reveals how long that commitment to defending it lasts, enduring inevitable scrutiny as the company grows.

In that way, intellectual property becomes part of a startup’s architecture of scale, protecting not ideas in isolation, but the foundations upon which resilient futures are built.

To learn more about how Smart & Biggar can help with your company’s IP Strategy please contact sbeney@smartbiggar.ca.

Through partners like Smart & Biggar, Altitude Accelerator helps companies scale. To find out more visit our website and review the programs we offer.

The post IP Strategy 101: Designing Safeguards That Scale appeared first on Altitude Accelerator.

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