Flagship Podcast

On this week’s show, we spoke with Katrina Albert, Co-founder & President @ Lux. Katrina is sustainability-minded sales and partnership professional. She wants to use entrepreneurship as a force to create good. Lux is an aerospace company specialized in the design, manufacturing and operation of atmospheric satellites (atmosats) for Earth observation. Their vision is to operate a global constellation of observation atmosats to acquire images at a resolution better than 10cm/pixel in order to create a live high-resolution digital twin of Earth’s surface

They are paving the way by assembling a constellation of observation atmospheric satellites over Latin America and Oceania to introduce the first real-time spatial information feed which automates operational decisions for mines, farms and electric utilities.

On the show, we spoke about:

• Her entrepreneurial journey
• How she’s working to become the version of herself
• The importance of self-knowledge and self-love
• The space robotics industry and its challenge
• Potential business models

Katrina has a contagious enthusiasm and energy. Her and her team are accomplishing amazing things in a short amount of time. I hope that you enjoy our conversation.

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Matthew He, Director of Investments @ Front Row Ventures. Matthew He is the Director of Investments of Quebec at Front Row Ventures, Canada’s first student run venture capital fund, with a growing portfolio of 12 of the most promising student ventures in Quebec, including CHK PLZ, Grad4, Rokulo, and Gallea.

Before joining FRV, Matt co-founded and scaled an educational non-profit from a team of 3 to 30, working with both the Government and industry leaders to bring Blockchain education to universities. Previously, he has worked as a Summer Analyst for White Star Capital and the Business Development Associate for FounderFuel ‘19. Matt is currently finishing his Bachelor of Sciences at McGill University, studying Microbiology & Immunology and Computer Sciences.

On the show, we spoke about:

• His love of water
• Getting into venture capital
• Advice for people starting out in their career
• The importance of diversity
• Front Row Ventures and their investments

Matthew is wise beyond his years. I really enjoyed my conversation and Matthew shared great insights for entrepreneurs young and old.

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Sebastien Brault, Co-Founder and CEO @ Wingocard.

Sebastien has spent the last 20 years helping to build the tech startup ecosystem in Montreal both as an entrepreneur and as an angel investor.
As an entrepreneur, he has founded and exited five online businesses, most of which have been centered around the social web (online communities, online dating, social networking, viral marketing). He’s experienced the thrills of growing a viral consumer product to 20M+ users and over 1B social connections on the B2C side, and the satisfaction of helping hundreds of clients grow their business with a B2B SaaS platform. No matter what the product or the market, he most enjoys the entrepreneurial process of bringing together great people to work on solving problems and creating value for users and customers. He has learned lots about fundraising, recruiting, business development, M&A, sales, HR … really anything and everything it takes to make a startup succeed. But the thing he loves and values most is building a great product.
He’s also been fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to invest and advise in the great entrepreneurs behind PasswordBox (sold to Intel in 2014), Frank & Oak, AmpMe, MakerBloks, Nesto, Real Ventures, Unito, and many others.

On the show, we spoke about:

• Starting and exiting five businesses
• How money can be the wrong motivation
• The importance of financial education particularly among teens
• How they are competing with WingoCard

I’ve always looked up to Sebastien and I’m really happy that he took the time to chat. Unsurprisingly, he shared great insights and looks to be off to the races with his next startup.

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Katy Yam, FounderFuel General Manager @ Real Ventures. Katy is a natural connector of people and ideas in service of helping good people succeed. As General Manager of FounderFuel, her ambition is to create an environment that helps founders level up quickly by filling knowledge and experience gaps with pairings from Real’s rich mentor ecosystem. She believes deep personal accountability and a #givefirst mindset will enrich every startup and accelerate their traction at FounderFuel and beyond. Prior to joining Real, Katy spent 3 years at Element AI, scaling up from pre-Series A to its current global footprint as Canada’s largest AI company. She is a multilingual executive with a 20-year history of managing high-performing product, business intelligence and marketing teams across various public and private industries including telco, CPG, gambling and AI. In her spare time, Katy leads TEDxMontréal, a non-profit dedicated to elevating Montreal-born ideas onto the global TED stage. A guest lecturer, board member, public speaker and triathlete, she adores reading fiction of all sorts and riding/running on Zwift to unwind.

On the show, we spoke about:

• The importance of adaptability and ambiguity
• Pushing your limits
• How good ideas shift your mindset
• Helping Founderfuel to become digital first
• The value of conscious leadership
• The concept of community realization and helping others

Katy was an absolute pleasure to speak with. She was incredibly open and shared so many great insights. I hope that you enjoy the conversation!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Paul Kruszewski, CEO & Founder @ Wrnch. Paul Kruszewski is a Canadian AI technologist and serial entrepreneur known for his work in artificial intelligence and computer graphics. He is the founder and CEO of wrnch, an AI and computer vision software engineering company based in Montreal, Quebec. He has founded three AI startups, including wrnch, specializing in crowd simulation, NPC behaviours, and human pose estimation. His projects have gradually gotten more complex as he's moved from developing AI software capable of understanding many people doing simple tasks to fewer people engaged in more complex tasks to perfect knowledge of individual body language.

On the show, we spoke about:

• How he started his third company and wanting to make a big impact
• Their work on seeing and understanding people
• Some of their amazing work covered in the NY Times
• How the current environment is accelerating the digitization of the world

It was such a pleasure to speak with Paul. He shared some great wisdom yet was very humble in this conversation. I learned a ton and I hope that you enjoy the conversation!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Guillaume Mercier, Partner @ BDC Capital. Guillaume Mercier is a Partner, Industrial Innovation Venture Fund for BDC Capital. Through his consulting and entrepreneurial experience, he brings meaningful operational and strategic expertise that benefits the ambitious early- to late-stage firms supported by the fund. One of his key areas of focus will be advanced manufacturing.

Before joining BDC Capital in 2020, Guillaume led small and large teams in various executive positions at start-ups and scale-ups such as SSENSE, Vention and Aevium (Lune Rouge). He was previously a principal at Real Ventures, investing in companies at the seed stage, and he spent four years at McKinsey & Company, advising large organizations on key strategic issues across a variety of industries, Guillaume started his career at Procter & Gamble in Toronto and also worked as a videogame producer in San Francisco for Take 2 Interactive. He is a board member for Montreal's Pour 3 Points, a charity that helps underprivileged youth learn life skills through sport.

Guillaume holds an MBA from Harvard University and a bachelor's degree in finance from Laval University.

On the show, we spoke about:

• His need for intellectual stimulation and innovation
• Getting into startup investing and lessons learned
• How startups and entrepreneurship help society
• Joining BDC Capital’s industrial innovation fund
• His three core sectors of focus
• The massive opportunity in hyper automation

Guillaume has already had an impressive career but I get this feeling that he’s only just started. He shared some great insights that I hope you find as useful as I did.

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Patrick Gagné, Co-Founder @ Bonjour Startup Montreal

With a focus on innovation and growth, Patrick brings 20 years of experience in general management, business strategy, product development, business development and team management. He contributed to the creation of 3 successful technology companies that transformed urban living in Montreal.

He co-founded Bonjour Startup Montréal which is a non-profit organization with a mission to facilitate the creation, growth and visibility of Montreal startups in order to position the city among the top 20 most dynamic ecosystems in the world.

On the show, we spoke about:

• Making an impact on the startup ecosystem
• His three objectives for Bonjour Startup
• How we can increase productivity in Quebec
• The talent and capital gap
• The concept of a startup concierge

Patrick is gunning for the top spot in terms of appearances on the podcast. His second interview did not disappoint. His vision for helping the startup ecosystem is inspiring. I hope that you enjoy the conversation!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Étienne Lacroix, Founder & CEO @ Vention. Etienne is a business leader and entrepreneur building and turning around engineering-intensive businesses. He is the founder and CEO of Vention, a software and hardware platform that enables manufacturing professionals to automate their production in just a few days.

Before Vention, he spent five years at McKinsey & Company as an Associate Principal with the Operations and Product Development Practices. In this role, he led enterprise-wide strategic, operational, and turnaround programs at global industrial and high-tech companies. Before joining McKinsey, he held various positions in product management, product development, and supply chain at General Electric as part of the Technical Leadership Program.

He holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, and a BA in mechanical engineering from the École de Technologie Supérieure.

On the show, we spoke about:

• Being an inventor from a young age
• Straight from the gut by Jack Welch and the ninja mindset
• Three questions to ask yourself in your career
• Vention’s mission and how they are reinventing manufacturing
• Their business model innovations from a product and go to market perspective
• The value of execution and being intellectually agile
• Raising money from world class investors and their plan to go big
• Vention’s unique culture

This interview was chock full of insights. Etienne is an inspiring leader and I was marvelled at the work they are doing. I hope that you enjoy the conversation!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with JF Renaud, Partner & Co-Founder @ Adviso. Jean-François Renaud is a partner and co-founder at Adviso. He is in charge of the development and branding of the company. His major contribution to the company includes developing partnerships with major national and international clients in a variety of industries, including retail, travel and tourism, manufacturing, and business services. Adviso’s major clients now include the National Bank of Canada, Reitmans, Aldo, Air Canada, Cirque du Soleil and LasikMD.

Jean-François has been teaching Electronic Commerce at HEC Montreal for over 10 years, is an Expert Coach at the École d’Entrepreneurship de Beauce, and is also the official trainer for Quebec’s Google Partner Academy. He is also a regular guest in Canadian media as well as digital business publications.

He completed a Business Administration degree and an M.Sc. in Electronic Commerce at HEC Montreal.

On the show, we spoke about:

• Getting his start in digital marketing in early days of the web
• Growing Adviso and working with Canada’s largest brands
• How adaptability is the 10X skill necessary to succeed
• The concept of entrepreneurial succession and how he plans on selling his company to his employees
• Becoming a manager versus an entrepreneur
• How having a quarterly focus is the enemy of long-term thinking
• Adviso’s blog

I admire JF and his team enormously. As usual, I left inspired after talking to him. I hope that you enjoy the conversation as much as I did!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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On this week’s show, we spoke with Louis Brun, Co-founder and CEO @ Sollum Technologies. Louis is a seasoned entrepreneur and business development executive with a successful track record in the mobile telecommunications and IT industries. He brings together a unique experience in technology start-ups and venture capital supported by extensive international business development experience, integrating solid product/marketing strategies with comprehensive sales and finance plans. He’s the co-founder of 3 companies with 2 successful exits, latest venture, Neuralitic, a big data analytics leader in the wireless ecosystem, was acquired by Guavus, a Silicon Valley based company.

He’s passionate about technology and bringing innovation to the market. He believes in alignment creating great focus is the foundation of successful companies.

On the show, we spoke about:

• How Louis got started in technology and entrepreneurship
• Being too early in the mobile space
• Working at Neuralitic and the exit
• Finding work with a purpose
• Translating a vision into a plan

Sustainable energy is a fascinating area and Louis & his team are rapidly innovating in that space. I hope that you enjoy today’s conversation!

Let us know what you think. What types of guests would like to see on the show? What topics interest you the most? Send me your thoughts at [email protected]

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