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Manmeet Maggu remembers being a fourth-year University of Waterloo student when his nephew, Praneit, was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. With an illness that affects muscle tone, movement and motor skills, Maggu’s family braced for the reality that Praneit would never take his first steps.

Studying to become an engineer at the time, Maggu and classmate Rahul Udasi (BASc ’14) began searching for solutions. After no suitable options appeared, the pair put their mechatronic skills to work, applying what they had learned at Waterloo to address a global problem.

Smart cities are moving towards the automation of many essential services. Quality of life for city residents relies on the safety of its buildings, roads, bridges and other infrastructures. Manual inspection of these infrastructures, besides being costly, is a tedious task that requires special skills and intense labour — especially when access to some sites, like bridges, is not easy. Due to the sheer number of bridges and inspection timelines, there is a critical backlog for inspecting bridges in Canada that requires an immediate solution.

Autonomous airline Ribbit has signed a $1.3 million contract with Transport Canada to start testing its commercial cargo aircraft to deliver goods to northern Canada, starting in 2024. 

“Ribbit ultimately exists to help improve access to transportation,” Jeremy Wang, co-founder and COO, said. "Our dream would be a future where anybody can receive goods quickly and reliably no matter where they are located.” 

Wang said the company’s initial goal is to serve northern Canada, where about 120 million pounds of food gets delivered annually. 

“These are northern, isolated communities where all cargo gets flown in by air and the cost of food and rates of food insecurity are very high,” Wang said. 

How would the treatment experience and outcomes change for cancer patients if we could actively deliver chemotherapy drugs directly to their tumours?

What if large and complex kidney stones could be dissolved without the need for invasive procedures?

Earlier this year, the Narwhal Project released their annual Narwhal List, which tracks Canadian technology companies that are on their way to unicorn status based on their billion-dollar annual revenues.    

The Narwhal Project has evaluated more than 900 Canadian technology companies that have received more than $10 million dollars of capital. Recognizing four Waterloo companies — ApplyBoard, Avidbots Corp, Auvik Networks and eSentire — as some of the fastest-growing Canadian technology companies.

Last weekend, University of Waterloo students on a multi-school autonomous racing team achieved a personal best speed of 173.8 kph at a race on the Monza F1 Circuit in Milan, Italy.

The race, which featured five teams with members from universities around the world, was the Waterloo students’ fifth race, and the first on a road course rather than a banked oval track.

Cobionix, a robotics company, has raised a $2.8 million seed round to launch Codi, an industry-first tele-robotic medical imaging system. As part of the University of Waterloo’s Velocity incubator, Cobionix aims to increase diagnostic imaging access and lower healthcare costs by reducing procedure time, ultimately benefiting patient care.

Engineers at the University of Waterloo have discovered a new way to program robots to help people with dementia locate medicine, glasses, phones and other objects they need but have lost.

And while the initial focus is on assisting a specific group of people, the technology could someday be used by anyone who has searched high and low for something they’ve misplaced.

Able Innovation’s robotic patient transfer platform has found a home in Ottawa.

The company’s ALTA platform, which enables hands-free patient transfer, will be used at Saint-Vincent Hospital, a complex care unit of the Elisabeth Bruyère health network.

A tiny robot that could one day help doctors perform surgery was inspired by the incredible gripping ability of geckos and the efficient locomotion of inchworms.

The new robot, developed by engineers at the University of Waterloo, utilizes ultraviolet (UV) light and magnetic force to move on any surface, even up walls and across ceilings.