Are you curious about Waterloo’s entrepreneurial community?
Did you know the Conrad School offers entrepreneurship education for all Waterloo students?
This spring term, take a course at the Conrad School to jump-start your entrepreneurial career and enhance your degree!
The University of Waterloo values experiential learning that takes student experience beyond academics. This is exactly why Kevin Ye, MBET candidate 2024, was drawn to explore the Master of Business, Entrepreneurship and Technology (MBET) program.
Students will be competing in a surprise challenge game when they arrive and can earn points which go toward cool prizes that will be awarded at the last game ($150 value!!).
This event is a great opportunity for collisions between:
RSVP by March 18th if you plan on attending.
Working as a communicator in a health care setting, Seun Adetunji could see the impact medical jargon was having on people with English language barriers and disabilities. During repeated interactions with doctors and medical staff, she could see that patients and caregivers were overwhelmed hearing medical language and instruction.
Seun decided to do something about it. She created MedInclude, an AI-based data processing platform that can help health-care providers transcribe patient notes into lay terminology in real time.
This fall term, Enterprise Co-op students took part in the Ignition Week pitch competition. Meet the winners!
Within just a year of starting the Master of Business, Entrepreneurship and Technology (MBET) program, Chinazom Uwaoma had already founded two promising startups, both aimed at driving social impact in Canada and around the world.
Inspired by his experience finding housing when he first arrived in Waterloo region, he and fellow MBET student Ernest Onuorah created MergeToOwn, an online platform that reduces barriers for first-time homebuyers by supporting successful co-ownership.
And he didn't stop there. Chinazom also created ESOTE, a platform that uses AI technology to support startups around the world to easily recruit junior and intermediate co-op students from Canadian postsecondary institutions.
It was a question from a rural farmer in Ghana that planted the seed of a new business in Lydia Konlan's head. "How do I find markets for my products?"
This led her to create FarmicleGrow (formerly Rural Agrihub), a business that uses demand data to understand customer and wholesale business needs that can be shared with rural farmers so they can successfully bring their products to market.
When she was diagnosed with cervical cancer in 2019, Rachel Bartholemew (MBET '14) learned the surgery and radiation would affect her pelvic health for the rest of her life. She began researching rehabilitation options and discovered women were still using devices known as dilators, which were invented in 1938. So, she founded Hyivy Health, a startup that is developing a rehabilitation system to help women recover from everything from cervical cancer and gender-affirming surgery to childbirth.
Sushan Shetty (MBET ' 22) works for Mastercard as an Associate Managing Consultant. He takes customer data and creates personalized, real-time communications for his clients. These new tactics reshape marketing techniques that have been used by credit card companies for decades. Read on to learn about how entrepreneurship becomes intrepreneurship. This different take on innovation within a company is exactly what Shetty is doing in his current role. Learn about how his experience in the MBET program has allowed him to stand out.
Andrew Martinko (BASc ’15, MBET ’16) is the co-founder of Suncayr and its hero product, SpotMyUV, a UV detection sticker that tells you when to reapply sunscreen. It works by placing a small, round sticker on your skin that’s purple when it goes on and turns clear when you apply sunscreen, absorbing the product just as your skin does. When the sticker turns purple again, it’s time to reapply.
Tapping into the entrepreneurial ecosystem at the University of Waterloo, Martinko and his engineering Capstone team leveraged the entrepreneurial opportunities available to them at UWaterloo to turn an idea into a viable product.