Stories of Innovation
INNOVATE® Austin Volume 2
SPLASH
A RIPPLE IN INNOVATION, A WAVE OF COMMUNITY.
A sustainably minded hub for entrepreneurship, start-up life, innovation, and community – leading the start-up world – that is Splash. Splash Coworking (Splash) the model of a shared work space and business resource center where entrepreneurs, independent professionals and creatives connect, collaborate and make business happen. Located in downtown San...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
HEAVY CHEF
THERE’S A SAYING THAT GOES NEVER TRUST A SKINNY CHEF. THIS GOES FOR BUSINESS ADVISORS, CONSULTANTS, AND EXPERTS, TOO
A Heavy Chef is someone that speaks authoritatively about a specific subject because they have vast experience in that area. Some of our Heavy Chefs are not internationally known but still making a notable impact in their spaces, or who’s been performing notable work in the background. It is someone...
INNOVATION Quebec
THE RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF THE MCGILL UNIVERSITY HEALTH CENTRE (RI-MUHC)
THE RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF THE MCGILL UNIVERSITY HEALTH CENTRE (RI-MUHC) IS A UNIQUE INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM AFFILIATED WITH THE FACULTY OF MEDICINE AND HEALTH SCIENCES AT MCGILL UNIVERSITY. A global leader in precision healthcare across the lifespan, the RI-MUHC is home to more than 600 researchers, 1472 research trainees and 1,300...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
Union Kitchen
HOW A FOOD BUSINESS ACCELERATOR IN WASHINGTON,DC IS PAVING THE WAY FOR THE NEXT BIG CPG BRANDS
Cullen Gilchrist founded Union Kitchen in 2012 to partner with food businesses of all sizes to grow and scale their success. Cullen got his start in the food industry with his sister and friends when they opened the Blind Dog Cafe. Faced with the challenge of increased demand and not...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Gresham Smith
Pioneering Innovation in Design
Gresham Smith, a leading architecture, engineering, design and consulting firm that has called Nashville home for more than 50 years, is an industry leader in innovation. At Gresham Smith, innovation is not just about adopting emerging technologies—it’s about transforming the design and planning process to create healthier, more connected communities....
INNOVATION Quebec
Kemitek
CCTT IN GREEN CHEMISTRY AND PROCESS SCALE-UP
Founded in 2002, Kemitek is both a CCTT and a Canadian Technology Access Centre (TAC) affiliated with the Cégep de Thetford. Our mission is to help companies innovate in the fields of green chemistry and process scale-up while actively contributing to the continued existence of a regional centre of excellence...
INNOVATION Quebec
LA VAGUE
THE ISLAND ACCELERATOR
The Corporation d’innovation et de développement des Îles, LA VAGUE, is an organization that creates a place of excellence to foster synergy between socio-economic stakeholders from the Magdalen Islands and elsewhere. Its vision is oriented towards a sustainable and wealth-creating Island economy. It offers specialized support to accelerate innovative projects...
INNOVATE™ Oeiras
Alcon Portugal
Driving Innovation To Help People See Brilliantly
Impulsionar A Inovação Para Ajudar As Pessoas A Ver Brilhantemente
Alcon is the global leader in eye care, dedicated to helping people see brilliantly. With a heritage of more than seven decades, we offer the broadest portfolio of products to improve people’s vision and lives. Our surgical and vision care products touch the lives of more than 260 million people...
INNOVATION Quebec
CRIAQ
AT THE HEART OF AEROSPACE INNOVATION
CRIAQ plays a key role in ensuring the development of new aerospace technologies that enable the entire ecosystem to prosper. Quebec is one of the 3 main aerospace centres in the world and the effervescence of its industrial industry and research centres makes it a prime location for innovation. In...
INNOVATE® Nashville
ATIBA
TECH IS HARD. BITS, BYTES, ACRONYMS, AND BUZZWORDS— OH MY!
When we started our Nashville-based technology consulting firm Atiba all the way back in 1992, the tech services world was relatively simple. When a business needed tech help, they simply opened The Yellow Pages and looked under “Computer Consultants” to hire any one of the dozen or so Nashville IT...
INNOVATION Quebec
NGTC
YOUR GO-TO PARTNER FOR MORE RESPONSIBLE USE OF ENERGY
Founded in 1992, NGTC is a non-profit research and development center that specializes in energy technologies. Although the use of natural gas is at the origin of its raison d’être, NGTC has been actively working, since 2007, on integrating new energy sources, notably renewable natural gas, hydrogen, aerothermal and solar...
INNOVATE™ Toronto
MOUNTX
Making Real Estate Investments Accessible To Everyone
At MountX we build a safe and simple marketplace that eliminates the inaccessibility and bureaucracy of traditional investments by making real estate investments accessible to everyone, without a large financial investment or previous experience. MountX Real Estate Capital Corp. is creating the next generation of digital financial products to...
INNOVATE® Nashville
NASHVILLE INNOVATION ALLIANCE
FUELING INNOVATION FOR A THRIVING NASHVILLE
The Nashville Innovation Alliance aims to make Nashville one of America’s leading centers of technology innovation by bringing the community together to create a shared vision, set ambitious goals and advance strategic initiatives. Established by Mayor Freddie O’Connell and Vanderbilt University in 2024, and anchored by participation from LaunchTN, the...
INNOVATE™ Vancouver Vol.2
BEATDAPP
THE BUGGLES TOLD THE WORLD THAT VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR. RELEASED IN 1980, THEIR HIT SONG, “VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR,” MAY NOT BE ACCURATE TODAY. MORE THAN 10% OF ALL STREAMED MUSIC IS FRAUDULENTLY STREAMED, WIPING OUT BILLIONS OF DOLLARS THAT WOULD HAVE OTHERWISE BEEN PAID TO ARTISTS AND LABELS
Beatdapp is a streaming fraud detection company. It helps music labels and artists track their songs to collect royalties. Think of it as a PWC for music play count. The company has a set of machine learning and predictive algorithms to detect streaming manipulation and has over 30 patents across...
INNOVATE™ Botswana Vol.1
XANDYE
THE QUINTESSENTIAL, MODERN COVER TABLE, CONTEMPORARY CLASSICS AND LIFESTYLE BRAND THAT PRIDES ITSELF IN EXCELLENT QUALITY THAT IS ON PAR WITH ENTRY-LEVEL LUXURY PIECES
According to its founder and current Creative Director, Sandra Tebogo Kenanao, “Xandye is another name for ‘luxury’. We don’t compromise when it comes to quality. We design our products from scratch, taking time on detail and simple – yet elegant – aesthetics. We select the material and hardware to be...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
Peoplr
Turning HR Headaches Into Great Business Results
ELEVATOR PITCH Peoplr is a team of Human Resources experts who tackle all kinds of headaches and turn them into great business results by providing flexible and cost-effective strategies that address a company’s human resources needs. From start-ups to thriving Fortune 100 companies, Peoplr has each client covered with expert...
INNOVATE™ Stockholm
HEARTRUNNER
THE POWER OF VOLUNTEERS: COLLECTIVE ACTION WHEN EVERY MINUTE COUNTS
Heartrunner Sweden is a small and expanding company founded in Stockholm, driven by the conviction that volunteers have the power to make a difference. With this core belief, they have pioneered technology for time-critical emergencies, alerting volunteer responders to provide swift cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in out-of-hospital cardiac arrests (OHCA) before...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
FLIKSHOP
BRIDGING GAPS, REUNITING FAMILIES AND ENDING RECIDIVISM
“We want to create a footprint in this community that kicks in doors to give access to folks like me.” When Marcus Bullock was just 15, he faced a life-altering challenge. Arrested and sentenced to eight years in adult maximum security prison for carjacking, he found himself in a...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
THE MAKERSPACE
WE DRIVE SOCIAL COHESION THROUGH THE COMMON LANGUAGE OF MAKING, A LANGUAGE THAT TRANSCENDS CLASS & CULTURE AND THAT UPLIFTS AS IT ENLIGHTENS
By leveraging the natural generosity inherent in maker culture, the project is able to unlock a new level of efficiency in skills transfer. Creating a safe environment where anyone can learn to use new technologies, where experienced professionals can share their knowledge and help the next generation. Makers” make things,...
INNOVATION Quebec
THE CONCORDIA APPLIED AI INSTITUTE (AI2)
The Concordia Applied AI Institute (AI2) is a multidisciplinary applied research unit representing more than 120 Faculty members and their graduate students from the 4 Concordia University Faculties: Arts and Science, Fine Arts, Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science, and John Molson School of Business. Organized in 3...
INNOVATE® Georgia
THE CITY OF ALPHARETTA
THE SUBTLE RISE OF A TECH HUB
Situated between bustling downtown Atlanta and the tranquil the North Georgia mountains, the City of Alpharetta is emerging as a notable example of how a community can quietly yet effectively embrace innovation and growth. This story isn’t about rapid expansion or high-profile advancements; it’s a tale of how Alpharetta has...
Global Innovation Spotlight
The economy of the fandom experience:
Merch, innovation, and sustainability
Everybody’s part of a fandom nowadays, with many people being part of several communities for different musicians, bands, movies, series, and sports teams at the same time. Since many are quite passionate about the fandoms they’re part of, it’s natural that they’d want to wear their interests on their sleeve....
INNOVATE™ Flanders
FOUR & FIVE
Business Advisors Disguised as Lawyers
In a rapidly evolving world where technology consistently outpaces the law, bridging the divide between legal frameworks and innovation has become more critical than ever. At the heart of this intersection lies Four & Five, a boutique law firm founded six years ago by Dimitri Coun and Anneleen Vander Elstraeten...
INNOVATE™ Toronto
BLUEROCK THERAPEUTICS
DARES TO ASK, “WHAT IF?"
At BlueRock, our mission is to create authentic cellular medicines to reverse devastating diseases, with the vision of improving the human condition. Built on the research of some of the world’s foremost experts in induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) biology, BlueRock has revolutionized and scaled methods for creating authentic...
INNOVATE® Austin Volume 2
SPLASH
A RIPPLE IN INNOVATION, A WAVE OF COMMUNITY.
A sustainably minded hub for entrepreneurship, start-up life, innovation, and community – leading the start-up world – that is Splash. Splash Coworking (Splash) the model of a shared work space and business resource center where entrepreneurs, independent professionals and creatives connect, collaborate and make business happen. Located in downtown San...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
HEAVY CHEF
THERE’S A SAYING THAT GOES NEVER TRUST A SKINNY CHEF. THIS GOES FOR BUSINESS ADVISORS, CONSULTANTS, AND EXPERTS, TOO
A Heavy Chef is someone that speaks authoritatively about a specific subject because they have vast experience in that area. Some of our Heavy Chefs are not internationally known but still making a notable impact in their spaces, or who’s been performing notable work in the background. It is someone...
INNOVATION Quebec
THE RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF THE MCGILL UNIVERSITY HEALTH CENTRE (RI-MUHC)
THE RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF THE MCGILL UNIVERSITY HEALTH CENTRE (RI-MUHC) IS A UNIQUE INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM AFFILIATED WITH THE FACULTY OF MEDICINE AND HEALTH SCIENCES AT MCGILL UNIVERSITY. A global leader in precision healthcare across the lifespan, the RI-MUHC is home to more than 600 researchers, 1472 research trainees and 1,300...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
Union Kitchen
HOW A FOOD BUSINESS ACCELERATOR IN WASHINGTON,DC IS PAVING THE WAY FOR THE NEXT BIG CPG BRANDS
Cullen Gilchrist founded Union Kitchen in 2012 to partner with food businesses of all sizes to grow and scale their success. Cullen got his start in the food industry with his sister and friends when they opened the Blind Dog Cafe. Faced with the challenge of increased demand and not...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Gresham Smith
Pioneering Innovation in Design
Gresham Smith, a leading architecture, engineering, design and consulting firm that has called Nashville home for more than 50 years, is an industry leader in innovation. At Gresham Smith, innovation is not just about adopting emerging technologies—it’s about transforming the design and planning process to create healthier, more connected communities....
INNOVATION Quebec
Kemitek
CCTT IN GREEN CHEMISTRY AND PROCESS SCALE-UP
Founded in 2002, Kemitek is both a CCTT and a Canadian Technology Access Centre (TAC) affiliated with the Cégep de Thetford. Our mission is to help companies innovate in the fields of green chemistry and process scale-up while actively contributing to the continued existence of a regional centre of excellence...
INNOVATION Quebec
LA VAGUE
THE ISLAND ACCELERATOR
The Corporation d’innovation et de développement des Îles, LA VAGUE, is an organization that creates a place of excellence to foster synergy between socio-economic stakeholders from the Magdalen Islands and elsewhere. Its vision is oriented towards a sustainable and wealth-creating Island economy. It offers specialized support to accelerate innovative projects...
INNOVATE™ Oeiras
Alcon Portugal
Driving Innovation To Help People See Brilliantly
Impulsionar A Inovação Para Ajudar As Pessoas A Ver Brilhantemente
Alcon is the global leader in eye care, dedicated to helping people see brilliantly. With a heritage of more than seven decades, we offer the broadest portfolio of products to improve people’s vision and lives. Our surgical and vision care products touch the lives of more than 260 million people...
INNOVATION Quebec
CRIAQ
AT THE HEART OF AEROSPACE INNOVATION
CRIAQ plays a key role in ensuring the development of new aerospace technologies that enable the entire ecosystem to prosper. Quebec is one of the 3 main aerospace centres in the world and the effervescence of its industrial industry and research centres makes it a prime location for innovation. In...
INNOVATE® Nashville
ATIBA
TECH IS HARD. BITS, BYTES, ACRONYMS, AND BUZZWORDS— OH MY!
When we started our Nashville-based technology consulting firm Atiba all the way back in 1992, the tech services world was relatively simple. When a business needed tech help, they simply opened The Yellow Pages and looked under “Computer Consultants” to hire any one of the dozen or so Nashville IT...
INNOVATION Quebec
NGTC
YOUR GO-TO PARTNER FOR MORE RESPONSIBLE USE OF ENERGY
Founded in 1992, NGTC is a non-profit research and development center that specializes in energy technologies. Although the use of natural gas is at the origin of its raison d’être, NGTC has been actively working, since 2007, on integrating new energy sources, notably renewable natural gas, hydrogen, aerothermal and solar...
INNOVATE™ Toronto
MOUNTX
Making Real Estate Investments Accessible To Everyone
At MountX we build a safe and simple marketplace that eliminates the inaccessibility and bureaucracy of traditional investments by making real estate investments accessible to everyone, without a large financial investment or previous experience. MountX Real Estate Capital Corp. is creating the next generation of digital financial products to...
INNOVATE® Nashville
NASHVILLE INNOVATION ALLIANCE
FUELING INNOVATION FOR A THRIVING NASHVILLE
The Nashville Innovation Alliance aims to make Nashville one of America’s leading centers of technology innovation by bringing the community together to create a shared vision, set ambitious goals and advance strategic initiatives. Established by Mayor Freddie O’Connell and Vanderbilt University in 2024, and anchored by participation from LaunchTN, the...
INNOVATE™ Vancouver Vol.2
BEATDAPP
THE BUGGLES TOLD THE WORLD THAT VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR. RELEASED IN 1980, THEIR HIT SONG, “VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR,” MAY NOT BE ACCURATE TODAY. MORE THAN 10% OF ALL STREAMED MUSIC IS FRAUDULENTLY STREAMED, WIPING OUT BILLIONS OF DOLLARS THAT WOULD HAVE OTHERWISE BEEN PAID TO ARTISTS AND LABELS
Beatdapp is a streaming fraud detection company. It helps music labels and artists track their songs to collect royalties. Think of it as a PWC for music play count. The company has a set of machine learning and predictive algorithms to detect streaming manipulation and has over 30 patents across...
INNOVATE™ Botswana Vol.1
XANDYE
THE QUINTESSENTIAL, MODERN COVER TABLE, CONTEMPORARY CLASSICS AND LIFESTYLE BRAND THAT PRIDES ITSELF IN EXCELLENT QUALITY THAT IS ON PAR WITH ENTRY-LEVEL LUXURY PIECES
According to its founder and current Creative Director, Sandra Tebogo Kenanao, “Xandye is another name for ‘luxury’. We don’t compromise when it comes to quality. We design our products from scratch, taking time on detail and simple – yet elegant – aesthetics. We select the material and hardware to be...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
Peoplr
Turning HR Headaches Into Great Business Results
ELEVATOR PITCH Peoplr is a team of Human Resources experts who tackle all kinds of headaches and turn them into great business results by providing flexible and cost-effective strategies that address a company’s human resources needs. From start-ups to thriving Fortune 100 companies, Peoplr has each client covered with expert...
INNOVATE™ Stockholm
HEARTRUNNER
THE POWER OF VOLUNTEERS: COLLECTIVE ACTION WHEN EVERY MINUTE COUNTS
Heartrunner Sweden is a small and expanding company founded in Stockholm, driven by the conviction that volunteers have the power to make a difference. With this core belief, they have pioneered technology for time-critical emergencies, alerting volunteer responders to provide swift cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in out-of-hospital cardiac arrests (OHCA) before...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
FLIKSHOP
BRIDGING GAPS, REUNITING FAMILIES AND ENDING RECIDIVISM
“We want to create a footprint in this community that kicks in doors to give access to folks like me.” When Marcus Bullock was just 15, he faced a life-altering challenge. Arrested and sentenced to eight years in adult maximum security prison for carjacking, he found himself in a...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
THE MAKERSPACE
WE DRIVE SOCIAL COHESION THROUGH THE COMMON LANGUAGE OF MAKING, A LANGUAGE THAT TRANSCENDS CLASS & CULTURE AND THAT UPLIFTS AS IT ENLIGHTENS
By leveraging the natural generosity inherent in maker culture, the project is able to unlock a new level of efficiency in skills transfer. Creating a safe environment where anyone can learn to use new technologies, where experienced professionals can share their knowledge and help the next generation. Makers” make things,...
INNOVATION Quebec
THE CONCORDIA APPLIED AI INSTITUTE (AI2)
The Concordia Applied AI Institute (AI2) is a multidisciplinary applied research unit representing more than 120 Faculty members and their graduate students from the 4 Concordia University Faculties: Arts and Science, Fine Arts, Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science, and John Molson School of Business. Organized in 3...
INNOVATE® Georgia
THE CITY OF ALPHARETTA
THE SUBTLE RISE OF A TECH HUB
Situated between bustling downtown Atlanta and the tranquil the North Georgia mountains, the City of Alpharetta is emerging as a notable example of how a community can quietly yet effectively embrace innovation and growth. This story isn’t about rapid expansion or high-profile advancements; it’s a tale of how Alpharetta has...
Global Innovation Spotlight
The economy of the fandom experience:
Merch, innovation, and sustainability
Everybody’s part of a fandom nowadays, with many people being part of several communities for different musicians, bands, movies, series, and sports teams at the same time. Since many are quite passionate about the fandoms they’re part of, it’s natural that they’d want to wear their interests on their sleeve....
INNOVATE™ Flanders
FOUR & FIVE
Business Advisors Disguised as Lawyers
In a rapidly evolving world where technology consistently outpaces the law, bridging the divide between legal frameworks and innovation has become more critical than ever. At the heart of this intersection lies Four & Five, a boutique law firm founded six years ago by Dimitri Coun and Anneleen Vander Elstraeten...
INNOVATE™ Toronto
BLUEROCK THERAPEUTICS
DARES TO ASK, “WHAT IF?"
At BlueRock, our mission is to create authentic cellular medicines to reverse devastating diseases, with the vision of improving the human condition. Built on the research of some of the world’s foremost experts in induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) biology, BlueRock has revolutionized and scaled methods for creating authentic...