Friday, May 02, 2008

Inundated with Innovators

Sadly, work kept me from attending this week's Canadian Innovation Exchange. It brought together venture capitalists and other interested service providers with 20 hot companies looking for financing or other support. Like a high-class Dragons' Den, but with more class and (mostly) less sarcasm.

The "Canadian Innovation Leader’ Award went to Toronto-based startup Octopz Inc.(http://www.octopz.com/), which develops advanced online collaboration technologies for creative professionals.

No, I don't know what that means either. It's from the press release. When I went to their website, they didn't do a good job of explaining it either. (How ironic. I guess they do a better job presenting live than on the Web.) But I did learn this:

"Octopz allows you to work collaboratively on an unprecedented range of document types that includes static content (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and images such as jpgs) and rich digital media, such as videos, audio, animations, Flash files, and 360ยบ panoramas.
"Octopz has easy-to-use templates for managing and building advanced media content, making it simple for users to create their own custom content."

In the release, Octopz CEO Ron McKenzie says this: “We are thrilled to win this award, which ideally positions us for the next phase of growth.”
It also says: "MacKenzie swayed attending delegates with an impressive and polished presentation that described the platform’s ability to accelerate decision making and speed-to-market for companies in the advertising, design and media sectors."

Pictured is the company mascot. His name is Inky.

The runner-up was Montreal-based Akoha Inc. (http://www.akoha.org/), with a presentation for a massive multi-player reality game that just recently received $1.9 million in angel funding.

The 20 companies in the CIX showcase were shortlisted from over 100 applicants by a committee of leading investors. The award winner was determined by a vote among attending delegates conducted through text messaging.

Now that's innovative!

CIX will returning next year as an annual event.
For more information on CIX and the CIX Award winners, go to http://www.canadianinnovationexchange.com/.Video content from CIX is available on blip.tv. Go to http://www.blip.tv/ and search CIX or visit the showpage at http://cix.blip.tv/#872746.

3 comments:

Stuart R. Crawford said...

Hi Rick, just want to say what a great job you did with Mandie on Roaring Women Radio. I have been listening to it for the past few weeks as a I work out in the morning.

I am in Toronto this weekend for the SMB Nation conference at the Microsoft Canada headquarters.

Enjoy the wet Ontario weather

Stuart Crawford
Calgary, AB
http://www.stuartcrawford.com

geoperdis said...

Rick, thanks for writing about Octopz at the Canadian Innovation Exchange. 

If you'd like to learn more about our online collaboration service you can view a video describing our latest features at http://blog.octopzlive.com/media/whats_new/ 

Also, I would be very happy to show you Octopz at work in a live online session at your convenience. Please email or call if you're interested.

Best,

George


George Perdicaris / geoperdis
Product Evangelist
Octopz Inc.

Email:   george@octopz.com
Direct:   (416) 673-8540

Website: www.octopz.com
Blog: thepond.octopzlive.com

Anonymous said...

You have to love the capability of collaborating with an entire team without having to step a foot out of your front door if you wanted to. Web conferencing is such an amazing feature that more and more people are starting to partake in, especially with the rise in gas prices. It is nice to see that this program is compatible with numerous different types of file formats.