KI student named one of "The Next 36" entrepreneurs

He came to Waterloo from British Columbia, partly for the Knowledge Integration program and partly “because it’s the closest thing Canada has to Silicon Valley.”

Now second-year student Max Brodie, who is doing a joint degree in Knowledge Integration and Computer Science, has the support of a prestigious program to help him get a new entrepreneurial venture off the ground.

The Next 36 bills itself as “a groundbreaking initiative to transform the country’s most promising undergraduates into Canada’s top entrepreneurs.” Brodie, 19, calls it “a mashup between an educational program and a startup incubator.”

The 36 participants, selected from more than 1,000 applicants across Canada, are put into teams of four. For five months, they work together remotely on developing a new business venture focused on mobile or tablet applications.

Then, from May to August, participants gather in Toronto for an intensive experience that includes classes by professors and business leaders, plus plenty of time and help to advance their startups.

Each team gets significant seed capital – up to $50,000 – and is paired with two mentors. They also get access to legal, accounting, and other professional advice. At the end of the summer, teams pitch their ventures to potential investors.

Brodie is one of seven University of Waterloo students chosen this year. Two of the others – Edward Sun and Konrad Listwan-Ciesielski – are on his team, along with Emilie Cushman of the University of Windsor. At the moment, the two other Waterloo students are in California on work terms, so they videoconference almost every night at 11:30, Ontario time.

None of the team members is new to entrepreneurship – certainly not Brodie, who is currently on an enterprise co-op term, working with a partner on flockwire.com, a way to bring social networking to grandparents.

The team is still trying to figure out exactly what their project will be, but Brodie thinks they’ll still be working on it a few years from now. “You have to believe that what you’re doing will succeed,” he says.

Brodie says Knowledge Integration is helping him build an entrepreneurial mindset. “My definition of innovation is creatively correlating previously unrelated ideas,” he says. “KI is excellent training to do just that.”