What The Tech?

Today I am thrilled to welcome to the show Kris McCarthy, Co-Founder and COO of FanSaves. Now, FanSaves is a sports tech startup and digital platform that offers fans discounts and deals from sponsors of their favorite sports teams and organizations. They provide partners with unlimited digital sponsorship inventory that is trackable through the FanSaves backend dashboard.

Their product is unique in that it offers partners a true turn-key perk that can be added to their membership benefits, while being fully integratable into team websites and mobile apps. This allows FanSaves partners to drive fan traffic back to their own digital assets, helping drive engagement all year round.

As unique as the innovation that Kris is driving at FanSaves is, his journey into the startup space is just as interesting. Before entering the startup game, Kris spent seven years playing minor professional hockey while winning two championships before transitioning into the front office, serving as the Director of Sales for two minor professional hockey teams back in 2017.

Needless to say, he’s had a view into the world of professional sports from almost all angles, and I can’t wait to pick his brain about what’s in store for Kris, FanSaves and his take on the larger startup ecosystem as we dive headlong into 2024.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I’m thrilled to welcome Jason Terry from General Ledger Partners onto the show. As a Certified Public Accountant, Jason has more than 15 years in the finance and accounting space, having successfully worked for public, private, and not-for-profit entities with annual revenues ranging from $6M to over $600M.

At General Ledger Partners, Jason and his team offer bookkeeping, general ledger cleanup, and financial consulting services to small businesses and startups, managing the accounting function to maximize their company's potential. It’s a mission our team at Boast knows well and shares, as we have worked with Jason to help innovative clients capture R&D tax credits to recoup a portion of their R&D spend and help extend their product runway.

I’m thrilled to have Jason on to discuss his work in the startup space, the genesis of General Ledger Partners, and the challenges their customers face, as well as what his experience has been wrangling R&D tax credits, working with Boast and supporting customers with a successful capital strategy.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I’m thrilled to be joined by two guests as part of our Founders & Friends series! For these shows, we encourage a member of our network to extend the invitation to a new friend to hop on the mic to talk about their founder stories and get their take on building a successful startup in today’s market!

Joining us first is our friend Alina Guidu, CEO of Muze, a platform that enables Independent artists to release music and connect directly with their fans, bypassing the traditional gatekeepers in the music industry and ensuring artists get access to up to 90% of their work’s revenue. She’s an experienced entrepreneur with a demonstrated history of driving success in the media and Web3 industries, and I’m excited to learn how she’s putting these skills to use disrupting the way music is shared in the twenty-first century.

Joining Alina and me is Saleha Jaweid, who is a Toronto-based IT Operations Rockstar with a wealth of experience driving innovation across Canada, where she’s focused on creating highly productive technology teams. She currently leads IT Ops at Topl, the world’s first blockchain built for tracking, tokenizing, and monetizing positive impact. She has worked with many different companies and startups as both a tactical team member and funder, helping them become operationally savvy and inculcate a Lean-Agile mindset.

For both Alina and Saleha, there is a lot of R&D and innovative tech involved in their current missions, and I can’t wait to learn about what they’re working on today, how they got into the startup space in the first place, and their goals for the future!

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I am thrilled to welcome onto the show Tarig Abdellatief, Managing Director of Arctech Accelerate. Based out of Ottawa, Tarig’s team sets a national standard for grant and proposal writing, business development and lobbying sector services, representing businesses across software, manufacturing, healthcare, Space Tech, Military, Not-for-Profit and virtually any other sector driving innovation in Canada today. 

Tarig utilizes a deep understanding of government programs, policies and protocols to help the founders and entrepreneurs he works with maximize their access to the resources they need to succeed. 

He’s put this knowledge to work partnering with Boast and other leaders in the startup ecosystem for a series of recent webinars hosted by Startup Stack, and has been an invaluable resource personally in helping  me understand what it takes to build a successful startup in Canada. 

I’m truly so excited to pick Tarig’s brain about his journey in the startup space, the role his team has played in helping businesses achieve growth at Arctech Accelerate, and what he sees for the future of his organization and startups across Canada. 

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I am thrilled to welcome Daniel Shum onto the show. Daniel is the Chief Operating Officer at CTK Bio, a Canadian cleantech startup that’s researching, developing and manufacturing solutions that combat climate change and environmental pollution. Their technology is a game changer, converting wasted by-products into truly biodegradable and compostable goods that are designed to break down in managed and unmanaged environments.

Daniel’s team is very clear in their mission, to ensure that in all processes where ideas meet technology, CTK Bio not only promises success, but strives to accelerate the world's transition to sustainable products.

It’s a lofty mission, and Boast has been proud to partner with Daniel and the CTK Bio team. In this episode, I look forward to learning more about how Daniel got into the space, the great work the team at CTK Bio is doing, what it’s been like partnering with Boast to tap into R&D tax credits, and plans for the future!

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I’m thrilled to welcome Kenneth Berger onto the show. With 20+ years in the tech industry, Kenneth helps startup leaders get unstuck and make their dreams happen. As an executive coach to dozens of top founders, Kenneth shares the tools he’s developed throughout his career to help leaders articulate what they truly want and take a courageous stand for those desires.

Kenneth's Services: https://kberger.com/

He’s a former founder in his own right, having helped create businesses backed by Andressen Horowitz and Accel, and was one of the earliest key hires over at Slack, acting as their first Product Manager as Slack grew from 100k to 1M+ daily users.

Needless to say, he’s been on the front lines of technological innovation and behind the scenes of some of the most impactful brands of the 2000s, and I’m excited to pick his brains and share his insights with our podcast community.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I am thrilled to welcome onto the show Sean Languedoc, Founder and CEO of Outforce.AI. Formerly known as Global Talent Accelerator, Outforce transforms outsourcing from a daunting task to a strategic asset to accelerate delivery for venture-backed companies. Outforce filters out all the noise and quickly matches clients with the best suited engineering agencies - filtering down to agencies that can not just deliver but also seamlessly blend with existing company culture.

Sean’s team at Outforce have a database with over 77,000 software agencies from next door to off shore. They quickly get to the top ten and do deeper due diligence from there so clients don't waste any time talking to any companies that aren’t a fit. Their unique approach has a remarkable 98% hit rate, enabling tech companies to ramp up their engineering capacity swiftly and confidently without a dent in quality, cost, or time.

But this is just one pillar of Sean’s story, as he’s spent more than 25 years immersed in the tech space and built 4 companies from ideas into thriving enterprises. He continues to immerse himself in the startup ecosystem as a mentor, guiding budding entrepreneurs through the complex landscape, and providing them with the resources and network to thrive.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I’m thrilled to welcome to the show Daniel Rizzi, Co-Founder and GC at We-Watch. Daniel’s mission is to help make the world a safer place without compromising people's data privacy or freedoms. To do so, he’s embarked on a unique social enterprise with We-Watch that essentially harnesses the power of community for social and criminal justice.

With the We-Watch app, users can find people who were nearby and witnessed when a specific incident—take, for instance, a vehicle collision—occurs, enabling the user to contact the witnesses to see if they can share observations or media related to the event. From there, the user can consolidate relevant information and media in the We-Watch app, helping them obtain recourse in conjunction with concerned parties and authorities.

It’s a truly innovative and very timely solution that can be a silver bullet for numerous scenarios. But while Daniel is a co-founder in his own right, he’s also an advisor to founders across Canada, helping them raise the capital they need to scale while navigating around any potential legal roadblocks to their success. 

I can’t wait to get his take on the startup scene today, the work he’s doing at We-Watch and what’s on the horizon.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I’m thrilled to welcome to the show from Silicolabs, Benjamin Alsbury-Nealy, Co-founder and CEO, and Kyla Alsbury-Nealy, Co-Founder Chief Operating Officer. 

Benjamin and Kyla are driving some serious innovation over at Silicolabs, leveraging emerging technology to bridge the gap between Neuroscience and Artificial Intelligence. They do this by creating tools that enable anyone to leverage tech like virtual reality, augmented reality, and AI within a framework designed for creativity and collaboration.

The results? Silicolabs customers can easily create virtual experiences that simulate real-world scenarios to train and assess humans & AI behavior, saving precious time and resources.

It’s a hot market for sure, and one steeped in research and development, and we’re excited to ask Benjamin and Kyla how they got into the space in the first place, the many applications and use cases of their cutting-edge tech, and their opinion on what it takes to succeed in the current startup ecosystem.

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Today I am thrilled to be joined by Caroline Arzoo, Director of Partnerships at Omnisync, a VC and government-backed software and services company that’s helping drive the development of world-transforming and game-changing innovations. 

This team truly leans on innovation, using modern AL/NLP-powered context-matching algorithms to create non-obvious connections between public and private innovators, scouts, and funders. Once a connection is made, Omnisync’s workflow tools help the parties execute on exciting new opportunities and collaborate on projects, unlocking critical resources such as early-stage funding, key partnerships, deep market intelligence, and predictive insights, for the go-getters in the innovation ecosystem..

In Caroline’s role, she works with teams like Boast that have a shared mission of driving innovation by giving passionate founders access to the resources they need to achieve growth. She’s the perfect person for the job, as she also contributes as a Mentor to the Founder Institute in their San Diego and Silicon Valley chapters, adding further proof to just how passionate Caroline is about empowering innovators to make an impact.

She certainly has worked with some great minds in her career to date and I can’t wait to pick her brain about the awesome innovators she’s working with today and Omnisync’s plans for the future!

Without further ado, welcome to the show Caroline!

Boast accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence.

Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth.

Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.