For immediate release
May 7, 2012
Ottawa, Ontario — The Honourable Gordon O'Connor, Minister of State and Member of Parliament for Carleton-Mississippi Mills, on behalf of the Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario), today announced an investment of up to $1,947,250 that will help three Ottawa-area start-up businesses get their innovative products and ideas to market faster, and create jobs and economic growth in southern Ontario.
The investment will allow these businesses to leverage a total of $3.9 million in additional private sector investments from venture capital and southern Ontario angel investors. These projects are expected to create 40 high-quality jobs in the information technology sector in southern Ontario over the next two years.
"Our government is investing in the residents, businesses and communities of southern Ontario to create high-quality jobs and sustain economic growth," said Minister of State O'Connor. "This investment will allow Benbria, Protecode and Toushay to develop new products, branch out to new markets, enhance their competitiveness and create high-value job opportunities for southern Ontario."
The funding, which is being provided through the FedDev Ontario's Investing in Business Innovation initiative, breaks down as follows:
- $750,000 for Toushay Inc., to create a software platform that lets businesses easily design, create and manage their own mobile applications for marketing and related interactions with customers;
- $680,000 for Protecode Inc., to develop and commercialize software that lets developers identify intellectual property issues, reduce licensing uncertainties, enhance quality and security, and ensure compliance with open source and third party licenses; and
- $517,250 for Benbria Corp., to develop an intelligent notification system that allows organizations to spread information to targeted audiences instantly, and act on the responses.
The Investing in Business Innovation initiative is designed to boost private sector investment in start-up businesses to accelerate the development of new products, processes and practices and bring them to market. This initiative is also designed to help angel investor networks and their associations attract new investment and support the growth of angel investment funds.
Please refer to the backgrounder for more information about Toushay Inc., Protecode Inc. and Benbria Corp.
Created in 2009, FedDev Ontario supports the southern Ontario economy by building on the region's strengths and creating opportunities for jobs and economic growth. The Agency has launched a number of initiatives to create a Southern Ontario Advantage and place the region in a strong position to compete in the global economy. These initiatives are designed to encourage partnerships and support projects that help the region's businesses and communities become more competitive, innovative and diversified. To learn more, please visit www.feddevontario.gc.ca or call 1-866-593-5505.
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For more information, contact:
Michele-Jamali Paquette
Director of Communications
Office of the Honourable Gary Goodyear
613-947-2956
Media Relations
FedDev Ontario
519-571-6879
FedDev Ontario is investing a total of up to $1,947,250 in repayable contributions to three Ottawa-area start-up businesses under the Investing in Business Innovation initiative. This investment will allow the businesses to leverage a total of $3,914,700 in additional investments from venture capital and angel investors.
The three start-up businesses include:
Contribution: up to $750,000
Toushay is a leading provider of innovative solutions for enhancing customer experience and service through the use of fixed and roaming mobile applications. The Toushay cloud-based solution enables enterprises to greatly reduce the complexity and cost of creating, deploying, and updating mobile applications, with minimal impact on IT departments. FedDev Ontario's investment leverages an additional $1.5 million venture capital investment from Wesley Clover International Corporation and angel investors from the Capital Angel Network. This will enable the company to develop a software platform which will let businesses design, create and manage their own mobile applications for marketing and related interactions with customers. The project is expected to create 20 new jobs.
Contribution: up to $680,000
Protecode solutions enable organizations to accelerate development through the managed use of open source software. Protecode uses code scanning that works behind the scenes in real-time with code libraries, build processes and desktops to detect and report open source licenses relative to company-defined policies. Software auditing services performed by a staff of open source licensing experts are also offered. FedDev Ontario's investment leverages an additional $1,380,200 from Brightspark Ventures to develop, test and commercialize a suite of software products that enable software developers to review and assess their inventories of developed software. This will allow developers to identify any intellectual property issues, reduce licensing uncertainties, enhance software quality and security, and ensure compliance with open source and third party licenses. The project is expected to create 11 new jobs.
Contribution: up to $517,250
Benbria enables companies to capture real-time customer input from a variety of sources, such as Twitter, Facebook, mobile apps, text, web, email, etc., and makes it actionable by directing it to front-line staff for action, resolution and follow up. The company's flagship products, BlazeLoop™ Customer Engagement and BlazeCast™ Customer Notification, helps companies to transform customer input into action by turning employees into active supporters, customers into advocates, and great customer experiences into repeat business and referrals. FedDev Ontario's investment leverages an additional $1,034,500 from BDC Venture Capital and Wesley Clover International Corporation. This will enable the company to develop and commercialize an intelligent notification system that enables organizations to spread vital information instantly to targeted audiences, such as employees, students, subscribers, and customers), and to track and act on their responses. The project is expected to create nine new jobs.
Investing in Business Innovation is designed to boost private sector investment in start-up businesses to accelerate the development of new products, processes and practices and help bring them to market. The Government of Canada is focusing on a portfolio of early-stage businesses that are recognized by the investor community as having the potential for high-growth and a net long-term economic benefit for southern Ontario. The investor community includes accredited angel investors from recognized angel investor networks in southern Ontario registered with the National Angel Organization – Ontario and venture capital providers who are member of Canada's Venture Capital & Private Equity Association.
Funding under the initiative is also available for angel investor networks and their associations to attract new investment and support the growth of angel investment funds.
Applications for funding are being accepted and assessed on an ongoing basis. For more information and to apply, please refer to the program guidelines available on the FedDev Ontario website at www.feddevontario.gc.ca.
