Startupfest Stories About The Past, Present and Future

For every startup launch that leads to funding, there is a unique story. Startupfest Montréal, which ran from July 14-15, showcased some of the best stories from speakers and audience alike.

The heat and humidity – and later, torrential rain – did nothing to dampen the enthusiasm around pitches given to a panel of investor judges, who offered a $200,000 prize for those with the best proposals.

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Competition was so fierce that the judges kicked more into the prize pot, and split the funds three ways: $160,000 to Toronto cinemagraph startup Flixel, (which TechPortfolio profiled earlier this year), $50,000 to “cannabis tech startup” Hello MD and $35,000 to 18-year-old Shaun Maclellan of YouCollab. 

“We had so many pitches that we liked but the spirit of this additional kid made us put in more money,” Startupfest founder Phillipe Telio told Montreal in Technology.

For a young company, a prize like this is about more than the cheque. Pitching to a panel of working investors forces founders to explain their business in a few minutes, and a win puts them in front of people who might lead their next round. Splitting the pot three ways meant three startups got that boost instead of one.

What’s a Cinemagraph?

Flixel’s big win is easier to understand once you’ve seen its product. A cinemagraph is a still photo in which one small part keeps moving: steam rising from a coffee cup, a flag rippling, hair blowing in the wind, while everything else stays frozen. The effect catches the eye in a social feed in a way a regular photo doesn’t, which is why brands and advertisers took an interest.

Flixel built tools that let photographers and marketers make cinemagraphs without hand-editing video frame by frame. The company still sells its Cinemagraph Pro software for Mac and iOS today.

#Startupfest Investment Prize oversubscribed! Kudos @Flixel, @HelloMD_com & @YouCollabapp on winning $245K in prizes pic.twitter.com/2IIxOb8dg6

— Tech Ed Canada (@TechEdCA) July 15, 2016

Stories From the Stage

Speakers shared stories about the future and the past. Alexis Ohanian, Co-founder of Reddit spoke about his experiences with online communities and pseudonymity while growing up in the early stages of the Internet – which contributed to the site’s unique ecosystem.

And Tim O’Reilly offered a hopeful prediction of the future where automation would give humans more meaningful work. “We’re going to do new kinds of work you couldn’t imagine,” he said. “Work on stuff that matters.”

For @alexisohanian, pseudonyms aren't about hiding, they're about freedom ► https://t.co/qlE00Z8X2V #Startupfest pic.twitter.com/VjKuYquSPG

— Tech Ed Canada (@TechEdCA) July 19, 2016

https://twitter.com/TechPortfolio/status/754498384824766464

Work on Stuff That Matters

O’Reilly’s message at Startupfest was an early version of a bigger argument. In October 2017, he published WTF? What’s the Future and Why It’s Up to Us with Harper Business. In it he looks at how platforms, on-demand services and artificial intelligence are changing business and the economy, and argues that companies can’t ultimately succeed unless the wider ecosystem around them succeeds too.

That’s a more hopeful take than many of the warnings about automation and jobs, and it matches what he told the Montréal crowd: automation should leave people with new and more meaningful work.

Startup Stories Captured

TechPortfolio talked to an investor about the importance of starting with a global perspective…

https://twitter.com/TechPortfolio/status/753717245382160384

two brothers from a family of entrepreneurs…

https://twitter.com/TechPortfolio/status/754440729364160513

a founder who discovered the excitement of adding value to his customers’ lives…

https://twitter.com/TechPortfolio/status/753673902770053120

…and the funder who turned down Hotmail nearly 20 years ago. (In 1997, Microsoft acquired it for $460 million.)

https://twitter.com/TechPortfolio/status/754059549255032832

Startupfest Since 2016

The festival has kept growing its pitch competitions since the summer of the three-way split. According to the organizers, Startupfest has awarded more than $9 million in investment prizes since it was founded in 2011, with $100,000 prizes now offered in categories such as Best of the Fest, Women in Tech and Black Entrepreneurs.

It’s still held in Montréal, now on the Old Port waterfront, and the organizers have announced the next edition for July 7 to 9, 2027. The founder-first format that made room for an 18-year-old to win $35,000 in 2016 is still at the heart of it.

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