Startupville

This episode is a compilation of clips from speakers at the UP Conference sharing their tips for building a product that customers can’t live without.

Learn from some of Canada and Silicon Valley’s top product experts about building a truly engaging product by listening to your customers and putting that data to work.

Uniting the Prairies, or UP, is a new conference in Saskatoon brings together the top prairie Canada startups, VCs and angels, prairie expats, and tech leaders to come together and share knowledge and experience with startups, elevating the prairie tech community.

This episode is a compilation of clips from speakers at the UP Conference sharing their tips for building culture and attracting top talent to your team.

With top leaders from billion dollar unicorns, major multinationals and the scrappiest of high-growth startups, this episode is packed full with amazing insights to help you attract and retain top talent!

Uniting the Prairies, or UP, is a new conference in Saskatoon brings together the top prairie Canada startups, VCs and angels, prairie expats, and tech leaders to come together and share knowledge and experience with startups, elevating the prairie tech community.

This episode is a compilation of clips from speakers at the UP Conference sharing their tips for raising capital for your startup, from when, to how and everything in between. 

Amazing fundraising tips from the best in the business, including Neal Dempsey, one of Starbucks' early investors, Debbie Landa, founder of the Grow Conference, and more!

Uniting the Prairies, or UP, is a new conference in Saskatoon brings together the top prairie Canada startups, VCs and angels, prairie expats, and tech leaders to come together and share knowledge and experience with startups, elevating the prairie tech community.

This episode is a compilation of clips from speakers at the UP Conference sharing their tips for nailing your sales funnel and refining your customer journey. 

Get great customer acquisition and retention tips from top leaders at Loblaw Digital, Jobber, Vendasta and more!

Uniting the Prairies, or UP, is a new conference in Saskatoon brings together the top prairie Canada startups, VCs and angels, prairie expats, and tech leaders to come together and share knowledge and experience with startups, elevating the prairie tech community.

Uniting the Prairies, or UP, is a new conference in Saskatoon brings together the top prairie Canada startups, VCs and angels, prairie expats, and tech leaders to come together and share knowledge and experience with startups, elevating the prairie tech community. 

UP was an electric conference that featured dozens of amazing speakers from companies like Shopify, Eventbrite, SingularityU and many more. We've distilled the best of UP into a seven part series giving you the best tips from the best in the business on how to build your tech startup, whether you're in the Canadian prairies, or from a small region anywhere in the world. 

This episode is a compilation of clips from speakers at the conference sharing their tips for early-stage founders, and some great startup stories from their lives in the trenches. 

We hosted a special live event at Innovation Place in Saskatoon, interviewing VersaBank’s David Taylor and Gurpreet Sahota in front of a live audience. 

VersaBank is a fully digital, branchless bank and FinTech company with offices in Saskatoon and London, Ontario that was founded in 1979 by David Taylor. David has a long history in banking, and has taken multiple companies to IPO, including VersaBank. They recently hired Gurpreet Sahota as their Chief Architect, Cyber Security, who most recently worked at Blackberry leading their cyber security team. 

David discusses the history of VersaBank, and why they have chosen to build and keep their company in the small regions of Saskatoon and London. Gurpreet shares some of the exciting new tech they’re working on, and how they’re starting to shake up the FinTech industry. 

Dan interviews Ryan Dumonceaux and Jon Lovering of Deloitte’s Innovation Incentives team, which helps tech startups and firms access government incentives that allow them to limit risk and grow faster. 

Ryan and Jon have both repatriated their hometown after working in top tech ecosystems like Kanata and Silicon Valley. Ryan cut his teeth with Nortel during the late-90’s tech boom, and Jon has over a decade’s experience building hardware products for Apple, Google, Amazon, and Lytro. 

Ryan and Jon chat with Dan about what drew them back to their home province, and the many things they’ve learned over the years. They also talk about how smaller regions can learn from Silicon Valley and other tech hubs to apply best practices while taking advantages of the strengths your region presents. 

Dan interviews Zaid AlShaddadi, a recent immigrant to Saskatchewan from Saudi Arabia, who made the decision to move across the world for the opportunities in Canadian tech. 

Zaid has worked over a decade in tech, most recently from Oracle in a senior sales role. So Dan and Zaid talk about his experience moving to Canada for the opportunities in the growing tech industry, and his first impressions of Saskatchewan’s small but bustling ecosystem. 

Zaid is one of many people who have, and will immigrate to the province to grow the tech talent pool, so we get his feedback on how Canadian tech companies can effectively recruit and hire internationally. Plus, with over a decade in tech sales, Zaid shared with us some of his tips and tricks for selling tech to enterprise. 

Co.Launch is Canada’s hottest new accelerator for pre-seed tech startups. Dan talks with the winners of the most recent accelerator cohort, Kristy Ehman of Hyon Consignment, Nelson Wani of Autumn, and Alisha Esmail of Filtr Trade. 

Dan and company chat about the crash-course that is the Co.Launch program, and how their experience has shaped their startups moving forward. They each won a cash prize, but more importantly gained a valuable network of mentors, investors and colleagues along the way, which led to many insights that have propelled them forward to the next step. 

Co.Launch accepts startups from the idea stage to prototype, so the group discusses what led them to apply for the program, and advice for early founders and others who are dipping their toes in to the world of tech entrepreneurship. 

Dan talks with Kai Charette of Alttra Solutions. In this episode, they discuss the benefits and pitfalls of blockchain technology, and how to cut through the buzz to provide meaningful solutions to problems. 

Blockchain is a polarizing technology. With some saying its the future of the internet and others saying it’s an flash in the pan, it can be hard to cut through the jargon and address real problems. Regina’s Alttra Solutions is setting out to do just that, by working with companies to address problems that blockchain is uniquely suited to solve. 

Wherever you fall in the debate on blockchain as an underlying tech, its sparked discussion and large existential questions around the world, can make for very interesting conversations. Alttra is making the bet that this will be the case for years to come.