Conference opens doors, build bridges between industry, academia, government
Francisco Jardim is no stranger to pitch sessions that feature the best startups a nation has to offer. As the founding partner of VC firm SP Ventures, and now manager of the Sao Paulo Innovation Fund, Jardim has attended almost every pitch event Brazil has had over the past six years. He has seen competitions sponsored by Silicon Valley tech titans, and welcomed entrepreneurial delegations from the U.S. and the U.K.
But the best pitch-off event he has ever seen took place in December between a group of Brazil’s startups, picked from among the nation’s top accelerators, and a delegation from Canada. He doesn’t hesitate to admit that, as good as the Brazilian teams were, the Canadians had the edge.
“The Canadians were better prepared,” he said. “They had their MVPs (minimum viable products) better defined. Their target markets were better penciled out and were larger and more relevant.”
Why? In his view, the Canadians’ advantage arose from the fact that they hail from a stronger ecosystem for supporting new company creation and growth.
While Canada may have a more developed ecosystem, Brazil has a population of almost 200 million, one of the fastest-growing mobile technology markets in the world, and a strong agricultural and commodities sector comparable to Canada’s. Jardim finds that many startups and VC firms in Brazil are focused on web plays and mimicking what they see as the big trends in Silicon Valley, but he is focused on taking advantage of the similarities between Canada and Brazil in sectors such as agri-tech and commodities.
“I think there are a lot of things we can cooperate on together,” he said.
He isn’t alone. That pitch-off competition last month took place as part of Brasil-Canada 3.0. This annual conference was pioneered by The Canadian Digital Media Network (CDMN) to support the growth and prosperity of Canada’s digital media industry in the Brazilian market, to find common ground, and to lever each nation’s respective strengths.
In the pitch-off competition, 10 Canadian companies that had won an all-expenses-paid trip to the conference pitted their businesses against each other and 10 Brazilian startups.
”I was quite thrilled that we had 164 applications from across Canada,” said Dr. Kevin Tuer, managing director of the CDMN. “They were all fantastic companies. What we want to do more of going forward is show this isn’t just for startups, but for growing mid-sized companies as well.”
A new tool in the war against payment fraud
The Canadian winner in the competition was Ottawa-based Zighra, which levers mobile telephony, collective intelligence, and implicit user authentication to reduce online and offline payment fraud. The company already has operations in North America, the Middle East, and India.
For Deepak Dutt, Zighra’s CTO, the trip was about much more than the competition; it also allowed for some much-needed face time with a prospect that just happens to be one of Brazil’s top three banks. It’s the sort of customer win that would give the company more credibility at home within Canada’s financial industry.
“This had a huge impact as (the Brazilian bank) later said they didn’t believe our technology really worked until they had a chance to personally see it in action,” Dutt said. “Customers there also seem to prefer the high touch when dealing with vendors.”
Brazil is a big growth market for Zighra because of an advanced financial system in which banks are often early adopters of new technology. The in-person visit, as well as the strong showing in the pitch-off, also served to open doors with other potential partners, customers, and investors.
The win also positions Zighra to further develop its domestic market through the CDMN’s Soft-Landing Program, with a landing in Calgary that will coincide with the CDMN’s next Canada 3.0 conference in May.
Turning surplus into revenue
The Brazilian winner in the pitch-off was eStoks, which specializes in asset liquidation and the sale of surplus stock for large companies.
According to co-founder Arthur Rozenblit, eStoks saw the conference and the pitch-off as the ideal opportunity to expand its networking base. He also sees a great fit between Brazil and Canada.
“Brazil has a bigger market, but we don’t have the right government incentives and environment for entrepreneurship here yet,” he said. “It’s a good combination with Canada, which has a better developed ecosystem … we need to bring that knowhow here.”
eStoks will also be heading to Calgary in May for a soft-landing. Rozenblit is eager to take advantage of the opportunity to find investors and other entrepreneurs who would be willing to operate a Canadian branch of the company.
You can’t scout out a new market from your desk
Linquet may not have won the pitch-off competition, but it, like most of the other competing companies, emerged a winner anyway in terms of networking and business development.
“We’ve already had many conference calls with people interested in anything from partnerships to investment to manufacturing,” said founder Pooya Kazerouni.
The Vancouver-based company uses the cloud and small Bluetooth tags to make sure you never lose anything again. As one of the fastest-growing smartphone markets in the world, Brazil is central to Linquet’s growth plans. For Kazerouni, it was important to immerse himself in the culture to understand how people use and interact with mobile technology.
“These are not things you can find online,” he said. “You have to be on the ground and you have to meet the people.”
His goal is to find a local partner to represent the business in Brazil, and he is already planning a return trip. Taking part in Brasil-Canada 3.0 was a crucial first step to help establish credibility. He has already travelled to many overseas markets to present Linquet and found that having an introduction or endorsement from a government representative, such as Canada’s consulate general’s office, helps to open doors.
“One of the good things about going through a governmental delegation as a startup is being able to leverage that trust factor,” he said.
Continuing to build upon the business-to-business aspect of the conference is particularly important to Tuer, but he also noted that business, academic, and governmental relationships between the two countries are not new.
“What I continue to learn and understand about our relationship with Brazil is that it is not just starting, it’s been going on for a number of years,” he said. “There’s already a number of … projects and programs moving forward between the two countries.”