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Nine on the way to a billion
By Jon Parsons. This article was originally published on Waterloo News.
Nine startups with links to the University of Waterloo were named in a recent report tracking Canadian companies on their way to $1 billion annual revenues, including four companies that grew out of Waterloo’s renowned entrepreneurship program and startup incubator Velocity.
“Canada’s tech ecosystem continues to evolve,” says Adrien Côté, executive director of Velocity. “Communitech’s report adds a new lens and reveals the depth of impact people from the University of Waterloo make in Canada’s economy. Likewise, evolving the conditions that attract and support entrepreneurially minded people to Waterloo continues to be our mission.”
Waterloo’s distinctive innovation ecosystem encourages entrepreneurs by opening pathways from research to commercialization through incubators, corporate partnerships and a unique intellectual property policy that lets creators own what they invent.
The nine companies on their way to billion-dollar annual revenues with links to Waterloo are:
- ApplyBoard, an educational technology company that streamlines the application process for international students, which was co-founded by Waterloo alums Martin Basiri (MASc ’13) along with his brothers Meti and Massi Basiri. ApplyBoard was incubated at Velocity.
- Arctic Wolf, a cybersecurity company co-founded by Waterloo alum Kim Tremblay (BMath, ’84), has achieved tremendous growth since acquiring its “unicorn” status only two years ago.
- ClearCo, a financial technology company co-founded by Waterloo alums Andrew D’Souza (BASc ’08) and Ivan Gritsiniak (BMath ’16), achieved “unicorn” status in 2021.
- Ecopia, an artificial intelligence company co-founded by University of Waterloo alums Yuanming Shu (MSc ’10, PhD ’15) and Shuo Tan (MSc ’10), is changing how we map the world. Ecopia was incubated at Velocity.
- eSentire, a cybersecurity company founded by a Waterloo alum, Eldon Sprickerhoff (BMath ’91).
- Faire, a wholesale marketplace company co-founded by Waterloo alum Marcelo Cortes (BCS ’04) is currently valued at $12.4B. Faire was incubated at Velocity.
- Solink, a cloud video security company co-founded by Waterloo alum Mike Matta (BASc ’07).
- Trusscore, a building material company whose founder, Dave Caputo, is chair of the board for Communitech, and which was incubated at Velocity.
- Vidyard, a SaaS company co-founded by Waterloo alums Michael Litt (BASc ’11) and Devon Gallaway (BASc ’10), which provides a platform for asynchronous communications grew exponentially during the pandemic. Vidyard was incubated at Velocity.
Communitech partnered with well-known Canadian finance companies and business analysts to generate robust data for the report, which followed criteria related to annual revenue and year-on-year revenue growth.
Re-introducing the Curve with Dr. Christopher Taylor
This article originally appeared in The Catalyst e-newsletter.
The Curve with Christopher is a podcast series hosted by Dr. Christopher S. Taylor, associate vice-president of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Anti-racism, which features discussions about sports and its intersections with race, history, culture, and society.
Dr. Taylor will be re-launching “The Curve,” as a resource for starting productive exchanges on topics related to equity, diversity, inclusion, race and identity, expanding beyond just sports.
Starting September, new episodes of the Curve will be posted monthly on the office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion & Anti-racism Competency and Capacity Building webpage, as a learning resource.
Racism can take different forms and understanding this affect individuals, institutions, and systems is an important first step to dismantling racism and building a more inclusive community. The Curve aims to encourage conversation, educate and empower its listeners to act intentionally to eradicate systemic racism, bias and discrimination.
Dr. Taylor hopes to leverage the podcast as an informal, yet useful tool for increasing engagement and knowledge sharing and providing mentorship, skills training or professional development, while building community in an innovative format.
“Talking about racism is a necessary step towards addressing discrimination and inequities,” Dr. Taylor said. “For many individuals, particularly those who are just beginning to understand how institutional and systemic racism has affected the lives of others, these difficult conversations can be uncomfortable. The Curve acts as a learning resource for fostering meaningful and productive dialogue.”
The Curve also provides opportunities for members of the University community to access learning resources, without having to stare at a screen, or be confined to one space.
“For meaningful learning to occur, I believe all people must be challenged to think critically, to deconstruct their understandings of the world, and the people around them, he said. “I think The Curve is an excellent channel to assist in creating a learning space which encourages growth, while ensuring safety.”
Dr. Taylor is grateful to past guests of The Curve, who have shared stories, experiences and perspectives. He says that although he brings a wealth of expertise to these conversations, his role in this series will be more of a guide and facilitator.
Find recent episodes of The Curve here.
Mathematics alumni and researchers create new standardizations encryption
This article was originally published on the Faculty of Mathematics website.
As we dawn on the age of quantum computing and work to harness its power and potential, there is an inherited risk of new types of cyber attacks from these increasingly powerful computers. In preparation for this possibility, the United States National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) called on cryptographers in 2016 to create and vet new algorithms to protect government and industry digital communication from attacks by quantum computers.
Since this initial call to action, 69 different algorithms have been submitted and vetted with the final field narrowed down and announced in July 2022. Among those selected for standardization of general encryption was CRYSTALS-Kyber which features co-author John Schanck, who completed his Masters of Mathematics as well as his Ph.D. with the Department of Combinatorics and Optimization with a focus on cryptography and quantum information. Kyber was selected for standardization with a noted advantage as "comparatively small encryption keys that two parties can exchange easily, as well as its speed of operation".
In addition to the selection of Schanck, Combinatorics and Optimization Professor David Jao's project was selected to advance to the next round of consideration for standardization. Jao is the co-inventor and project lead for SIKE (Supersingular Isogeny Key Encapsulation), which is an alternate candidate for Public-key Encryption and Key-establishment Algorithms that relies on a different hard problem than all of the other post-quantum cryptosystems being evaluated by NIST.
Read more about Schanck's, Jao's, and the rest of the quantum-resistant cryptographic algorithms in consideration for standardization on the NIST website.