Entrepreneurship

Waterloo alumni keep some impressive company.

The 2018 Alumni Awards honour proud graduates whose passion, creativity and courage are transforming the world. Join us as we celebrate remarkable alumni, including a leader in hospital patient safety, a pioneer in the study of black holes, a champion of mathematics education and a team of entrepreneurs who are helping families save on their weekly grocery bills.

Over the past years, there have been reports of cruise ships that failed to manoeuvre and stranded people at sea, or failed wind turbines that were unable to generate power. These applications, and many others, have one thing in common in their design: bearings!

Exceptional students were recognized along with accomplished graduates and a longtime corporate supporter when more than more 400 people gathered in November for the 2018 Waterloo Engineering Awards Dinner.

In addition to hundreds of graduate and undergraduate students cited for excelling in academic and extracurricular pursuits, the annual event at Federation Hall honoured alumni in four categories and a company with a long history of backing researchers and students.

Whether it’s creating a mural in a public space or building a tiny mobile home, two Waterloo School of Architecture alumni are fulfilling their artistic passions in unique ways.

Stephanie Boutari (BArch ’11 and MArch ’14) and Adam Schwartzentruber (BArch ’11) chose to study architecture not knowing where it would lead, but driven by a common desire to pursue a creative career.  

My partner, Rob McGeachy, and I founded big river technologies inc. with two mandates: bring world-class consulting to the financial services industry and provide jobs and economic opportunities to Eastern Ontario.

big river technologies attracts first-class talent to solve complex enterprise challenges.

But it wasn’t a traditional job that was calling to me during this mid-life detour.

I knew I wanted to use what I had learned at the University of Waterloo in terms of urban planning and cities, and infuse it with green and with a new way of shaping and appreciating our urban environment. I had started seeing cities in a different way and was keen to share this vision and inspire others with the potential.

Nadayar Enegesi (BCS '13)
Alumnus, Faculty of Mathematics
> Co-Founder, Andela

With an acceptance rate of only 0.8 per cent, CNN has called African IT company Andela, one of the most selective programs in the world and “…harder to get into than Harvard.”

The University of Waterloo’s flagship entrepreneurship program, Velocity, is launching a startup investment fund in March. The fund will connect early-stage startups to the capital they need to grow their business while offering investors a simple way to invest in a diversified portfolio of startups from Canada’s most productive incubator.

The new fund will replace the grant system used to sponsor the awards for the incubator’s tri-annual Velocity Fund Finals (VFF) pitch competition at Waterloo. The winning startups will receive a minimum investment of $25,000 through the fund.

The University of Waterloo’s flagship entrepreneurship program, Velocity, is launching a venture fund that aims to connect early-stage startups to the capital they need. 

The new AngelList-powered venture fund, which will invest in startups in sectors ranging from software to biomedical, will launch this Spring. It will give investors a simple way to invest in a diversified portfolio of early-stage startups supported by Waterloo’s Velocity Garage. Since launching 10 years ago, Velocity has helped launch 300 companies who have collectively raised over $850 million in funding.

Chris Eliasmith
Professor, Faculty of Arts and Faculty of Engineering
> Co-Founder, Applied Brain Research inc.
> Director, Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience

The notion that robots could possess something akin to a human brain seems like science fiction.