Stories of Innovation
INNOVATE® Nashville
FIRSTBANK
PAVING THE WAY FOR A NEW WAVE
It’s not often you hear about companies that thrive for over a century, but FirstBank, from its humble start in rural West Tennessee in 1906 continues to evolve and conquer 117 years later. From its original mission of serving a small-town farming community, FirstBank, headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee with a...
INNOVATE® Georgia
EMORY
FOSTERING INNOVATION FOR A DATA AND TECHNOLOGY-DRIVEN WORLD
Emory University’s Goizueta Business School is a top-20 ranked business school. Emory University’s Goizueta Business School is a top-ranked driving force for change. In a vibrant global city, it prepares the future’s brightest minds principled leaders who believe in equitable business practices, constant innovation, and the critical intersection of business...
INNOVATE® New Jersey Vol.2
FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON UNIVERSITY
PERSONAL. GLOBAL. TRANSFORMATIONAL
THE HALLMARKS OF AN FDU EDUCATION ARE PERSONAL SUPPORT AND CONCERN, GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES AND OPPORTUNITIES, AND TRANSFORMATIONAL EXPERIENCES. HISTORY AND BACKGROUNDFounded in 1942 by Dr. Peter Sammartino and his wife, Sylvia (Sally), Fairleigh Dickinson University has grown into the largest private university in New Jersey. More than 11,000 students from...
INNOVATE® Nashville
MITER HEALTH
INTELLIGENT CARE DELIVERY PLATFORMS
The healthcare industry works towards caring, promoting health, and quality of life. The growing aging population and rise in cost associated with eldercare is a concern to home health care providers. The challenges faced by home health care providers are immeasurable. From rising costs to providing the care, tracking staff...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
YIEDI
A COMPANY DESIGNED BY ENTREPRENEURS FOR ENTREPRENEURS
Just over eight years ago the founder of YIEDI, Jayshree Naidoo and Jay Naidoo her business and life partner, sat across from a branding expert and outlined the vision for the company. They went on to describe a model that they had created, it was still drawn on a napkin...
INNOVATE® New Jersey Vol.2
JUMPSTART NJ
INVESTING IN EARLY-STAGE GROWTH COMPANIES IN NEW JERSEY AND BEYOND
JumpStart NJ Angel Network invests in early-stage growth companies with high potential and innovative technology that disrupts traditional businesses. The group of angel investors screens more than 100 companies each year and invests an average $1.5 million annually in leading-edge startups. Based in the Garden State, JumpStart NJ invests in...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Nashville State Community College
From Classroom to Career: Nashville State Powers Progress Through Education and Partnerships
A Good Fit. A Great Future. That’s how Nashville State Community College defines itself—serving diverse students from Nashville’s urban core to rural counties, each bringing unique backgrounds and experiences. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to how Nashville State serves its students and communities. In fact, with Vision 2030 – its...
INNOVATE® Northern Virginia
Parla Dynamics
Building the Multilingual Internet for the Next 5 billion Users
For decades, the internet has been framed as a global equalizer. It has quietly favored a narrow slice of the world. The world has always been multilingual. The digital infrastructure that connects it, however, was built predominantly in English. More than half of online content is still produced in English,...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
TEDx Jacksonville
Greatest Assets Are The Ideas And Dreams Of Its Citizenry
Our team has embraced the challenge of bringing the TEDx experience to Jacksonville because we believe our city’s greatest assets are the ideas and dreams of its citizenry. Ideas have the power to reshape minds and change the way people act. Dreams are the birthplace of the possible. But, too...
INNOVATION Quebec
CRITM
An essential resource in promoting innovation in metal transformation
The metal transformation industry holds a leading role in Quebec’s economy. Enterprises need to establish a clear edge and constantly innovate to overcome the numerous labour force, productivity, energy, and environmental footprint challenges they are faced with. Hence, it is on these grounds that the Metal Transformation and Innovation Consortium...
INNOVATE™ Adelaide
SA POWER NETWORKS
Flexible energy resources key to a low carbon future
South Australia is going through an exciting energy transition in which it is leading the world in the race to achieve a net-100% renewable energy system – a target that is likely to be achieved before 2030. The State has moved quickly to harness its significant wind and solar resources...
INNOVATE® Philadelphia
Stateside Brands
An Innovative Leader
Few ready-to-drink beverage brands have captivated the market like Surfside. Since its 2022 launch, Surfside has taken off like a rocket ship, becoming the fastest-growing brand within the entire alcoholic beverage sector. At the close of 2025, Surfside achieved 11.1 million case sales, growing an astounding 6.2 million cases from...
Global Innovation Spotlight
Explainable Is Too Soft:
in 2026 We Need Forensic Audit Trails in Medical AI
The epiphany didn’t come from a breakthrough in model architecture or a surge in accuracy metrics. It came from watching a physiotherapist from Lviv stare blankly at a screen. Dmytro Grybeniuk and Oleh Ivchenko, specialists in machine learning infrastructure, were attending the MedAI hackathon at Odesa National Polytechnic University not...
INNOVATE® Detroit
Newlab
Building the Future of Sustainable Mobility at Michigan Central
Newlab is a global network of purpose-built innovation hubs that accelerates climate and deep tech time-to-market. Newlab provides startups with physical infrastructure, direct investment opportunities, and pilot partnerships to drive meaningful commercialization outcomes and economic development in energy, materials, and mobility. Newlab established its Detroit home in 2023 to enable...
INNOVATE™ Vancouver Vol.2
BLACK BUSINESS ASSOCIATION OF BC (BBABC)
UNITY – EXCELLENCE – LEGACY
The Black Business Association of BC was founded by Nerissa Allen and Clavia Alleyne out of a need and passion for helping businesses at a critical point of time, when the Covid 19 pandemic was ravaging small businesses. They set out on a journey to not only support businesses through...
INNOVATE® Georgia
DATUM TECHNOLOGIES GROUP
DATUM DEFINES, DEVELOPS, AND DELIVERS INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS THAT SUPPORT BUSINESS NEEDS.
The company had a vision in 1996 to name it Datum Software, aka, Datum Technologies Group, well before “data” became a very common word in everyone’s vocabulary. Under Datum, we have three global brands—Innovations, Government, and Vela—committed to trust, transparency, and excellence. Datum is certified as a woman-owned and minority-owned...
INNOVATE™ Estonia
B.EST SOLUTIONS
REDEFINING SECURE DIGITAL IDENTITY WHILE STRENGTHENING LOCAL ECOSYSTEMS
Can a digital state be built from scratch with external expertise and support? B.EST Solutions has spent the past 15 years proving that it can. Founded with the mission of adapting Estonia’s pioneering digital state experience to new contexts, the company has become a trusted developer and operator of national...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Pathway Lending
Innovation with Purpose: Transforming How Communities Access Capital
In Middle Tennessee’s fast-growing economy, small businesses are driving innovation, creating jobs, and shaping the future of communities. But too often, promising businesses and catalytic projects can’t access traditional financing. That’s where Pathway Lending steps in. As a mission-driven Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) based in Nashville, Pathway strengthens communities...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
EVERYDAY SPEAK
CREATIVITY WILL MAKE THE 21ST CENTURY AFRICA’S CENTURY
Founded in 2017, by Melusi Tshabalala (creative professional, entrepreneur, author, speaker, humourist, language & culture activist), Everyday Speak is a culture, dialogue, language activism, advertising and design company. Driven by the ethos – Creativity can make the 21st century Africa’s century – Everyday Speak develops ideas and solutions that touch...
INNOVATE® Nashville
MobileFlow
Hytch and The Gamification of Movement
Modern transportation systems were not designed for how people actually live today. Cities have grown denser, work has become more flexible, schedules more fragmented, and travel patterns more complex. Yet mobility is still largely governed by static infrastructure and blunt policy tools. The result is familiar and costly: congestion that...
INNOVATE™ Kitchener Waterloo
CATALYST COMMONS
BUILT FOR ENTREPRENEURS, BY ENTREPRENEURS
In the heart of KW’s tech hub, a century-old industrial site has been reimagined as one of Canada’s largest privately held coworking spaces. What used to be Dominion Tire factory is now the home base for more than 170 companies who work out of Catalyst Commons. Inside its 120,000-plus square...
Global Innovation Spotlight
3 Proven Ways to Master Golf Indoors Effortlessly
3 Proven Ways to Master Golf Indoors Effortlessly To master golf indoors effortlessly, players are leveraging a trifecta of technologies: advanced launch monitors for precision data, realistic hitting surfaces for injury prevention, and immersive projection ecosystems for course simulation. These innovations allow golfers to build consistent swing mechanics and lower...
INNOVATE™ Kitchener Waterloo
CONESTOGA COLLEGE
INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY AND ADVANCED LEARNING
BUILDING COMMUNITIES AND CAREERS Waterloo Region is a catalyst for innovation. Its thriving ecosystem of startups, global tech giants and research institutions is driving collaboration to shape the future. Within this dynamic landscape is Conestoga College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning, a leader in polytechnic education that has become...
Global Innovation Spotlight
How Data Science Is Shaping Next-Gen Online Gaming
Data science is having an impact across many industries globally. It is described as being a multidisciplinary field that extracts meaningful insights and knowledge from raw data by combining techniques from statistics, mathematics, computer science, and domain expertise to uncover patterns, build predictive models, and guide data-driven decision-making within organizations....
INNOVATE® Nashville
FIRSTBANK
PAVING THE WAY FOR A NEW WAVE
It’s not often you hear about companies that thrive for over a century, but FirstBank, from its humble start in rural West Tennessee in 1906 continues to evolve and conquer 117 years later. From its original mission of serving a small-town farming community, FirstBank, headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee with a...
INNOVATE® Georgia
EMORY
FOSTERING INNOVATION FOR A DATA AND TECHNOLOGY-DRIVEN WORLD
Emory University’s Goizueta Business School is a top-20 ranked business school. Emory University’s Goizueta Business School is a top-ranked driving force for change. In a vibrant global city, it prepares the future’s brightest minds principled leaders who believe in equitable business practices, constant innovation, and the critical intersection of business...
INNOVATE® New Jersey Vol.2
FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON UNIVERSITY
PERSONAL. GLOBAL. TRANSFORMATIONAL
THE HALLMARKS OF AN FDU EDUCATION ARE PERSONAL SUPPORT AND CONCERN, GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES AND OPPORTUNITIES, AND TRANSFORMATIONAL EXPERIENCES. HISTORY AND BACKGROUNDFounded in 1942 by Dr. Peter Sammartino and his wife, Sylvia (Sally), Fairleigh Dickinson University has grown into the largest private university in New Jersey. More than 11,000 students from...
INNOVATE® Nashville
MITER HEALTH
INTELLIGENT CARE DELIVERY PLATFORMS
The healthcare industry works towards caring, promoting health, and quality of life. The growing aging population and rise in cost associated with eldercare is a concern to home health care providers. The challenges faced by home health care providers are immeasurable. From rising costs to providing the care, tracking staff...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
YIEDI
A COMPANY DESIGNED BY ENTREPRENEURS FOR ENTREPRENEURS
Just over eight years ago the founder of YIEDI, Jayshree Naidoo and Jay Naidoo her business and life partner, sat across from a branding expert and outlined the vision for the company. They went on to describe a model that they had created, it was still drawn on a napkin...
INNOVATE® New Jersey Vol.2
JUMPSTART NJ
INVESTING IN EARLY-STAGE GROWTH COMPANIES IN NEW JERSEY AND BEYOND
JumpStart NJ Angel Network invests in early-stage growth companies with high potential and innovative technology that disrupts traditional businesses. The group of angel investors screens more than 100 companies each year and invests an average $1.5 million annually in leading-edge startups. Based in the Garden State, JumpStart NJ invests in...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Nashville State Community College
From Classroom to Career: Nashville State Powers Progress Through Education and Partnerships
A Good Fit. A Great Future. That’s how Nashville State Community College defines itself—serving diverse students from Nashville’s urban core to rural counties, each bringing unique backgrounds and experiences. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to how Nashville State serves its students and communities. In fact, with Vision 2030 – its...
INNOVATE® Northern Virginia
Parla Dynamics
Building the Multilingual Internet for the Next 5 billion Users
For decades, the internet has been framed as a global equalizer. It has quietly favored a narrow slice of the world. The world has always been multilingual. The digital infrastructure that connects it, however, was built predominantly in English. More than half of online content is still produced in English,...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
TEDx Jacksonville
Greatest Assets Are The Ideas And Dreams Of Its Citizenry
Our team has embraced the challenge of bringing the TEDx experience to Jacksonville because we believe our city’s greatest assets are the ideas and dreams of its citizenry. Ideas have the power to reshape minds and change the way people act. Dreams are the birthplace of the possible. But, too...
INNOVATION Quebec
CRITM
An essential resource in promoting innovation in metal transformation
The metal transformation industry holds a leading role in Quebec’s economy. Enterprises need to establish a clear edge and constantly innovate to overcome the numerous labour force, productivity, energy, and environmental footprint challenges they are faced with. Hence, it is on these grounds that the Metal Transformation and Innovation Consortium...
INNOVATE™ Adelaide
SA POWER NETWORKS
Flexible energy resources key to a low carbon future
South Australia is going through an exciting energy transition in which it is leading the world in the race to achieve a net-100% renewable energy system – a target that is likely to be achieved before 2030. The State has moved quickly to harness its significant wind and solar resources...
INNOVATE® Philadelphia
Stateside Brands
An Innovative Leader
Few ready-to-drink beverage brands have captivated the market like Surfside. Since its 2022 launch, Surfside has taken off like a rocket ship, becoming the fastest-growing brand within the entire alcoholic beverage sector. At the close of 2025, Surfside achieved 11.1 million case sales, growing an astounding 6.2 million cases from...
Global Innovation Spotlight
Explainable Is Too Soft:
in 2026 We Need Forensic Audit Trails in Medical AI
The epiphany didn’t come from a breakthrough in model architecture or a surge in accuracy metrics. It came from watching a physiotherapist from Lviv stare blankly at a screen. Dmytro Grybeniuk and Oleh Ivchenko, specialists in machine learning infrastructure, were attending the MedAI hackathon at Odesa National Polytechnic University not...
INNOVATE® Detroit
Newlab
Building the Future of Sustainable Mobility at Michigan Central
Newlab is a global network of purpose-built innovation hubs that accelerates climate and deep tech time-to-market. Newlab provides startups with physical infrastructure, direct investment opportunities, and pilot partnerships to drive meaningful commercialization outcomes and economic development in energy, materials, and mobility. Newlab established its Detroit home in 2023 to enable...
INNOVATE™ Vancouver Vol.2
BLACK BUSINESS ASSOCIATION OF BC (BBABC)
UNITY – EXCELLENCE – LEGACY
The Black Business Association of BC was founded by Nerissa Allen and Clavia Alleyne out of a need and passion for helping businesses at a critical point of time, when the Covid 19 pandemic was ravaging small businesses. They set out on a journey to not only support businesses through...
INNOVATE® Georgia
DATUM TECHNOLOGIES GROUP
DATUM DEFINES, DEVELOPS, AND DELIVERS INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS THAT SUPPORT BUSINESS NEEDS.
The company had a vision in 1996 to name it Datum Software, aka, Datum Technologies Group, well before “data” became a very common word in everyone’s vocabulary. Under Datum, we have three global brands—Innovations, Government, and Vela—committed to trust, transparency, and excellence. Datum is certified as a woman-owned and minority-owned...
INNOVATE™ Estonia
B.EST SOLUTIONS
REDEFINING SECURE DIGITAL IDENTITY WHILE STRENGTHENING LOCAL ECOSYSTEMS
Can a digital state be built from scratch with external expertise and support? B.EST Solutions has spent the past 15 years proving that it can. Founded with the mission of adapting Estonia’s pioneering digital state experience to new contexts, the company has become a trusted developer and operator of national...
INNOVATE® Nashville
Pathway Lending
Innovation with Purpose: Transforming How Communities Access Capital
In Middle Tennessee’s fast-growing economy, small businesses are driving innovation, creating jobs, and shaping the future of communities. But too often, promising businesses and catalytic projects can’t access traditional financing. That’s where Pathway Lending steps in. As a mission-driven Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) based in Nashville, Pathway strengthens communities...
INNOVATE™ South Africa
EVERYDAY SPEAK
CREATIVITY WILL MAKE THE 21ST CENTURY AFRICA’S CENTURY
Founded in 2017, by Melusi Tshabalala (creative professional, entrepreneur, author, speaker, humourist, language & culture activist), Everyday Speak is a culture, dialogue, language activism, advertising and design company. Driven by the ethos – Creativity can make the 21st century Africa’s century – Everyday Speak develops ideas and solutions that touch...
INNOVATE® Nashville
MobileFlow
Hytch and The Gamification of Movement
Modern transportation systems were not designed for how people actually live today. Cities have grown denser, work has become more flexible, schedules more fragmented, and travel patterns more complex. Yet mobility is still largely governed by static infrastructure and blunt policy tools. The result is familiar and costly: congestion that...
INNOVATE™ Kitchener Waterloo
CATALYST COMMONS
BUILT FOR ENTREPRENEURS, BY ENTREPRENEURS
In the heart of KW’s tech hub, a century-old industrial site has been reimagined as one of Canada’s largest privately held coworking spaces. What used to be Dominion Tire factory is now the home base for more than 170 companies who work out of Catalyst Commons. Inside its 120,000-plus square...
Global Innovation Spotlight
3 Proven Ways to Master Golf Indoors Effortlessly
3 Proven Ways to Master Golf Indoors Effortlessly To master golf indoors effortlessly, players are leveraging a trifecta of technologies: advanced launch monitors for precision data, realistic hitting surfaces for injury prevention, and immersive projection ecosystems for course simulation. These innovations allow golfers to build consistent swing mechanics and lower...
INNOVATE™ Kitchener Waterloo
CONESTOGA COLLEGE
INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY AND ADVANCED LEARNING
BUILDING COMMUNITIES AND CAREERS Waterloo Region is a catalyst for innovation. Its thriving ecosystem of startups, global tech giants and research institutions is driving collaboration to shape the future. Within this dynamic landscape is Conestoga College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning, a leader in polytechnic education that has become...
Global Innovation Spotlight
How Data Science Is Shaping Next-Gen Online Gaming
Data science is having an impact across many industries globally. It is described as being a multidisciplinary field that extracts meaningful insights and knowledge from raw data by combining techniques from statistics, mathematics, computer science, and domain expertise to uncover patterns, build predictive models, and guide data-driven decision-making within organizations....