🦸♀️ She had 24 jobs before she was 27 years old
The many lives of Vancity’s Kirsten Sutton. Welcome to the Sunday Briefing.
Good morning! Somehow it’s March. How did that happen? We have no clue, but we’d like to find out. And you know what else we’d like to know? More about you, our reader. To that end, you’re invited to complete a short reader survey and help us get to know you a bit better. Why would you do that for us?
A Staycation Giveaway: Well, by completing it, you’ll help us improve our work, and as thank you, you’ll be entered into an amazing prize draw for the following:
Grand Prize: A 2-night stay downtown at the St. Regis Hotel including dinner for 2 at Gotham Steakhouse ($1,000 value 😍) to be redeemed at your convenience.
Runner Up Prizes: 3 x $100 gift cards to Best Buy.
The survey will take you just 4-5 minutes.
Now, let’s get into today’s newsletter. This week I’ve got 1,043 words for you, a 3 + 1/2-minute read. Enjoy!
Cover story: Kirsten Sutton has made a career of helping people find a common language
Vancity’s chief technology and information officer uses her varied life experience to put people on the same page. » Start reading.
The luxury NFT collection coming to you soon
Angel Pui has big plans for DiamondHandbag Club. » Continue.
The Salesforce-Vancouver love affair is 12 years in the making
How the San Francisco giant quietly became a local anchor company. » Start reading.
InBC appoints Leah Nguyen as chief investment officer
The 17-year technology and investment executive has her work cut out for her. » Start reading.
Meet the B.C.-born entrepreneur building fintech in the Caymans
Michelle Morgan's Vancouver-founded company, Advanced Alternative Investment Systems, provides an all-in-one platform for fund management. » Start reading.
VanHack waives placement fees on Ukrainian tech talent
The company aims to connect employers with 100’s of Ukrainian developers seeking remote work or relocation opportunities. » Continue.
Stephen Colbert shouts out Vancouver-based company on The Late Show
Dating app Snack got a mouthful from the talk show host. » Start reading.
Acetech Member Highlight: Standard Fusion
While implementing GRC (Governance, Risk-management, and Compliance) programs throughout their careers, the Standard Fusion team identified a market need for a scalable and cost effective platform. GRC solutions shouldn’t be reserved for those organizations with six figure budgets so they decided to fill the gap. Seven years later, Standard Fusion is now one of the leading GRC tools available, competing, and winning, against the big players in the market.
* Partner Message
🤝 Funding and deals
Vancouver-based Sanctuary AI raised $75.5 million in Series A funding to accelerate its human-like robots. » Continue.
A Spring Activator trio of Keith Ippel, Graham Day and Davina MacPhail are exploring Spring’s own Impact Fund. » Continue.
Ballard announced an MOU with the USD $150 billion-valued Adani Group, for hydrogen fuel cells in India. » Continue.
The Government of Canada announced a $240 million investment to support the Canadian semiconductor and photonics industries. » Continue.
🗞️ In other news…
Vancouver-based Fetti, co-founded by Ali Adab, launched a creator token for basketball creator, The Professor, as it looks to invest in Web3 platforms and help creators launch Web3 offerings. » tubefilter.
Applications for the FoundersBoost 2022, Spring, Vancouver Pre-Accelerator are Now Open. » Learn more.
Zymeworks co-founder and former CEO Ali Tehrani joins Amplitude Ventures as a venture partner. » Betakit.
Vancouver-based agtech firm Terramerra was named to Forbes’ #THRIVETop50 AgTech Report. » Continue.
The province is investing $116.6 million in funding to Health Research BC and another $78 million to Genome BC. » Continue.
Can you identify Canada’s top-performing public venture company? TSX is holding a competition to find Canada’s top public venture capitalist. » Continue.
Dapper Labs hires execs from Dropbox and Recharge Payments as its NFL NFT marketplace debuts to $5 million in sales. » CoinDesk.
A feature on Dr. Macarena Cataldo-Hernandez, co-founder of Viridis Research. » H20 Global News Magazine.
Small Business BC is hosting a bias-breaking panel for International Women’s Day. » BCBusiness.
Addy launched what they’re calling the first 100% affordable housing development on its investing platform. » Continue.
entrepreneurship@UBC welcomed Linh Le as the first joint Entrepreneur in Residence with its Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences. » Continue.
Vancouver Economic Commission celebrated 23 Black Canadians in Vancouver. » Get the list.
Spotlight on ChopValue, a company that is making furniture out of chopsticks. » InsideHook.
Campbell River aquatech company Poseidon Ocean Systems is making a big splash. » Continue.
Victoria’s LlamaZoo is partnering with First Nations to create digital twins of their territories. » CTV News.
New Canada Digital Adoption Program to help small businesses thrive in the digital economy. » Continue.
Get plugged in on the international electric car race coming to Vancouver this summer. » Vancouver Is Awesome.
💡 Ideas and insights
Kenndal McArdle, principal at Pender Ventures, writing in Vancouver Tech Journal: Why startups need to double down on their strengths if they want to take home gold
Christine Duhaime of Fusion Intelligence, writing in Business in Vancouver: The Ukraine war and protecting your business from Russian cyberattacks
Natalia Lumen, founder of ThyForLife Health, writing on Linkedin: How to Help Ukraine
Dave Dinesen, CEO CubicFarm Systems Corp., writing on LinkedIn: 3 Ways You Can Change The Future Of Food
Ryan Wong, writing in Forbes: This Is The Year Of The People-Powered Workforce — Here's Why
Cody Green, CEO & founder of Canada Drives, writing in Techcouver: Technology Has Changed The Way We Shop, And The Automotive Market Needs To Keep Up
Sue Paish, CEO of Digital Technology Supercluster, writing in The Toronto Star: Using data and digital tools to rethink health care
Roham Gharegozlou, CEO of Dapper Labs, joins Inc.’s Founder’s Project podcast to wax poetic on NFTs: Why This Founder Believes NFTs Are the Next Evolution of Social Media
Michael McCullough outlines how everyone’s favourite B.C. biotech stock might be able to find its way back up in BCBusiness: How AbCellera’s stock can make a full recovery
Sam Chan, VP of programs at Launch, interviewing McKinsey & Company partner Michael Lazar: Web3 and the Future of Work