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Startup Boot Camp

April 23rd, 24th, and 25th, 2010

With the generous support of our event sponsors, The Ottawa Network is pleased to host our second Startup Boot Camp event.

More sponsors to come…

This exciting event is designed is to bring together entrepreneurial minded people from Ottawa’s technology sector to lay the groundwork for new venture creation. The most promising company proposal judged at the end of the weekend will receive a $5,000 cash reward for incorporating within 90 days.

Many successful ventures start with great teams, and this venue will broaden your exposure to like-minded and capable potential partners with complimentary skills. You will be in “startup mode” for the entire weekend –it may not be for everyone– and this will be a great test of how well it suits you. Naturally, the mix of attendees, innovative ideas brought forward, event guidance skills and everyone’s effort and interest will determine the outcomes.

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TON Tuesday - Focus on Innovation
January 26, 2010 5:30-7:30 pm
hosted by bitHeads Inc.
1309 Carling Avenue
(entrance at east end of Westgate Shopping Centre)

Innovation is the engine driving Ottawa’s economy. Come hear and interact with our distinguished panel on various aspects of innovation. What is the role of innovation in the business context and economy? What management structures and behaviours are needed to establish and sustain it, and what characteristics constitute the individual innovator. Finally, thoughts on Ottawa’s prognosis for continuing to be a centre of innovation.

<Click here for registration details>

Claude Haw, President and CEO OCRI

Claude leads OCRI, Ottawa’s lead economic development agency. Prior to OCRI, Claude was Managing Partner and founder of Venture Coaches, a venture capital firm which invested in thirteen technology companies.

Claude has been actively involved with more than 30 tech companies over two decades from start-up to acquisition and IPO. With more than 30 years of experience in a variety of technical, management and venture investing roles in the technology sector Claude has been instrumental in the success of many Ottawa-based companies including Venture Coaches, DragonWave, Newbridge Networks and Mitel Corporation.

He is a director of the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce, a charter member of TiE Ottawa, and a past board member of the Canadian Venture Capital Association (CVCA). Claude is also a founder of The Ottawa Network and of Mindtrust, and served as a long-standing member of the annual Ottawa Venture and Technology Summit (OVTS) organizing committee.

As VP of Corporate Business Development at Newbridge, he managed strategic investment programs, from start-up to exit, in more than 20 companies. As VP and GM of the Newbridge ATMnet Business Unit, Claude grew the unit from inception to a $200-million-per-annum business. Also at Newbridge, Claude managed the Severn Bridge Investments fund, investing in 12 companies and returning more than triple the invested capital. He also held senior management positions at Mitel Corporation and Leigh Instruments.

Claude holds a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering from Lakehead University, has completed the Canadian Securities Course and is a member of Professional Engineers of Ontario. He has been a guest lecturer at universities on entrepreneurship, business planning and venture investing.

Tom Duxbury, Sprott School of Business

Tom is a new technology specialist who has been creating products, building teams and launching ventures for thirty years. He has held founding and senior executive roles in many entrepreneurial ventures, including DragonWave, Gridpoint, Newbridge/Alcatel, Mitel, and Pika Technologies. A widely patented inventor, Tom currently teaches innovation management at Carleton’s Sprott School of Business while completing his PhD there.

David Hudson, Director of Lead to Win

David V. Hudson is the Director of the Lead to Win program and is a student in the doctoral program at Carleton University¹s Eric Sprott School of Business. Until December 2008, Mr. Hudson was Nortel¹s Vice President for Advanced Research and Technology Labs. Since 1988, he held increasingly responsible management positions in Nortel both in engineering and product line management. Mr. Hudson worked in all of Nortel Networks¹ product lines, including enterprise, mobility and metro. He has held the Nortel seat on a number of university advisory boards. Mr. Hudson received Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Engineering from the University of Waterloo, Ontario.

He graduated from the Systems Design program at the University of Waterloo and his graduate work focused on pattern recognition and signal processing applied to earth resources imagery.

Moderator: Walter Knitl, The Ottawa Network

<Click here for registration details>

Gowlings Monthly TON “Starting your Startup Series”, Announces a 2 Part Seminar Series on Business Plans.

Part 1 – The Business Plan You DON’T take to the Bank
Tuesday January 12th, 2010 - 5:30pm - 7:30pm

Many new start-ups write a business plan with the sole purpose of raising capital.  However, a good business plan can be very useful for other reasons. It can help your start-up to: bring together your ideas and research into a structured format; to clarify and communicate business purpose to staff; to predict and plan for future scenarios and to set overall business strategy such as marketing strategy; and targets and objectives, including sales and financial targets, so that you can monitor your start-up’s performance.

The first seminar in this 2 part series will focus on how a business plan can be used to help your Company to stay focused on primary business objectives and to operate more efficiently.  The 2nd part of the series (Tuesday, February 9, 2010) will focus on the role of the Business Plan when your start-up is raising Capital.

Gowlings is very pleased to host Starting Your Start-Up, The Ottawa Network monthly event stream that combines quality networking with practical advice and insights from industry leaders and subject matter experts.  Starting Your Start-Up focuses on the business basics that are the foundation for launching and building a successful start-up in these promising and challenging times including financing, team formation, business & product development, sales, and marketing.

This event is provided at no cost for members of The Ottawa Network. Click here for registration details.

Jason Flick - Co-Founder and President at YOUiLabs - Jason Flick is a successful serial entrepreneur, and the product visionary in the company. Jason brings 18 years of technical and business leadership to the role of President. His most recent success was Flick Software, a mobile solutions and products venture whose customers included Intel, Rogers Wireless, U.S. military, and Sybase. Prior to founding Flick Software in 2002, he was co-founder and CTO at N-able Technologies, where he architected one of the most scalable IT systems in the world, built and managed the engineering team. Prior to N-able Technologies, Jason was Director, Systems Integration with Eftia, a leading OSS vendor, where he owned a $23M P&L business unit. His other roles and adventures have included COO, Canadian Health Systems and Vice President Engineering, TouchNet.

Andrew Bailes - VP Finance and Planning at Cryptocard - Andrew has had a strong career in the telecommunications and IT industries - both inside and as a management consultant. He has extensive experience in business and commercial planning, budgeting, modelling and business strategy, holding a wide and varied set of positions. He negotiated the multi million-dollar purchase of a mobile phone operator in Ghana and carried out the business modelling for a £2.5bn PFI bid for road maintenance. He managed the quantitative business case that enabled WorldCom to bid more than £3bn for a 3G mobile license. Andrew holds a MA in Mathematics and Management Studies from Cambridge University and is currently completing his Masters in Business Administration at Queens and Cornell.

Glen Orsak - Glen Orsak is veteran business advisor and coach to business leaders, owners and entrepreneurs.  Glen recently left Deloitte after a 20-year consulting career, 10 as a partner and leader of the firm’s Strategy and Operations practice in Ottawa.   In this role, he sold and delivered projects ranging from small strategic interventions through to multi-year, multi-million dollar business planning and implementation engagements.  He is now working with small businesses in management support and advisory roles where he drives the development of strategies and plans to strengthen business fundamentals and to position companies for rapid growth.  In addition to his consulting heritage at Deloitte, Glen holds an MBA from the Ivey School of Business at UWO and a certificate in common sense from his days growing up on a farm in Manitoba.

This event is provided at no cost for members of The Ottawa Network.  Click here for registration details.