Tash Ismail
Chief of Business Development, Mitacs
Joanne Fedeyko
Founder & CEO, CWN
Building an international network is challenging for a busy female startup enterprise, but innovative partnerships can help ease the way.
Women tech entrepreneurs are significant contributors to Canada’s innovation ecosystem. But to grow locally and scale globally, they need connections to international influencers, investors, and incubators.
A recent partnership between Mitacs and the Canadian Women’s Network (CWN) is allowing Canadian female tech founders to do just that, early on in their entrepreneurial journey.
Mitacs is a Canadian non-profit research organization that partners with industry, academia, and government to provide funding and resources to support Canada’s knowledge economy. The CWN is a community of 700 members across Canada whose goal is to support women founders by giving them access to its network of global investors, mentors, and executives.
Enabling women to network
The evidence of the benefits women bring into the economy are clear, organizations with greater numbers of female talent in Executive and Board positions show materially improved performance and impact. Yet, still today, we see too few women in leadership positions. This is why the partnership between Mitacs and the Canadian Women’s Network is particularly exciting. Through this collaboration, a group of outstanding Canadian women, at the forefront of innovation and entrepreneurship, get to participate in the Pathways to Silicon Valley program, supporting them into spaces where they belong, can learn and make greater impact.
At Mitacs, we recognize that talent, and more specifically female talent, is critical to the success of Canada’s innovation system.
“At Mitacs, we recognize that talent, and more specifically female talent, is critical to the success of Canada’s innovation system,” says Tash Ismail, Chief of Business Development at Mitacs. “Through our programming, we’re able to create meaningful connections and to foster the new partnerships necessary to drive economic growth and improve quality of life for all Canadians.”
Through support from Mitacs, 16 Canadian female founders were able to travel to San Francisco to participate in the CWN signature program, Pathway to Silicon Valley. “We’re thrilled to partner with the CWN and to help make it possible for this group of outstanding Canadian women, who are at the forefront of innovation and entrepreneurship, to participate in the Pathway to Silicon Valley program,” says Ismail.
Success drives demand
The partnership with Mitacs allowed CWN to scale and expand the program, adding more participants to this year’s event. In addition to networking events, panels, workshops, and executive coaching, founders pitched and received feedback from CWN’s investor network.
“We’ve all heard that your network is your net worth, and that couldn’t be truer for founders looking to raise capital,” says Joanne Fedeyko, CWN Founder and CEO. “It’s critically important for founders to start building a network before they need it, and the CWN’s Pathway to Silicon Valley program enables women founders to make over 100 industry connections with investors, executives, and successful founders in order to build a high-value network and scale into a world-class business.”
Loreen Wales, Founder of My Viva Q&A Panel
Can you tell us about your business?
My Viva is a digital health company that drives efficiency in the clinic setting through the creation of automated lifestyle care plans for chronic disease management and that supports patients at home to take control of their health.
As a woman entrepreneur, what challenges have you faced growing your business? How has support from Mitacs helped to address these challenges?
Digital health is a challenging sector in Canada with very long sales cycles (two to four years) and a longstanding lack of support for Canadian entrepreneurs, which I’m really hoping is changing because we have so much amazing talent in this country. Having Mitacs’s support to attend the Pathway to Silicon Valley program was a huge help to introduce me to an ecosystem in the U.S. as we roll out our U.S. strategy.
What advice would you give to other aspiring entrepreneurs?
Seek out an accelerator program early on, as you’ll meet other entrepreneurs going through the same things as you are. It will help you build your support network, and you’ll be able to accelerate your learnings through one another.
Azadeh Mostaghel, Founder of ORCHID Analytics Q&A Panel
Can you tell us about your business?
ORCHID Analytics is a health care technology company providing AI-driven analytics to solve the health care industry’s biggest management challenges. Our predictive analytics software helps hospitals and clinics optimize capacity management, scheduling, patient flow, staffing, and resource allocation.
As a woman entrepreneur, what challenges have you faced growing your business? How has support from Mitacs helped to address these challenges?
Access to capital and market entry have been the most challenging aspects. There have been incidents where we were engaged for our services for no pay and others that haven’t paid to date. It’s been disheartening to deal with large health care organizations, in a contractual and financial sense. Taking part in Pathway to Silicon Valley with the support of Mitacs and the MEI program has allowed us to begin our fundraising journey and to create a concrete path to get access to capital.
What advice would you give to other aspiring entrepreneurs?
Get as much advice as you can, synthesize it, and take note but discard any pieces of advice that aren’t applicable in terms of getting you to where you want to go. And never forget your vision and the reason you wake up every day
To discover how a partnership with Mitacs can take your innovation goals to the next level visit mitacs.ca/en/industry.
