2024, a Capsule Review
The team at Nventure would like to thank everyone who made 2024 possible, from our stellar Board of Directors to our passionate and dedicated staff, to Nventure's wonderful partners and funders. And to all of the innovative entrepreneurs and industrial leaders we work with day in and day out who are at the forefront of economic advancement: you make our work endlessly interesting, exciting and daring.
As our thriveFORWARD initiative came to a close backing 179 industrial innovation capital investment projects across southern Ontario, 2024 was marked by many other important milestones for our organization:
Corporate governance revitalization
A successful rebrand
A new website
Launch of Season 2 of the Frontier Entrepreneurship Podcast (featuring Canadian ag/biotech and agri-food innovation) hosted by Braden Kemp (Bioenterprise Canada) and Tracy Morningstar (Canadian Council for Indigenous Business) featuring Canadian ag/biotech and agri-food-related innovators
Operational enhancements, platform integrations, experimental AI and creation of a new unified application portal
DELIA (backed by ISED Canada) became a fully self-sustaining national fund (100+ loans/year to women-owned businesses across Canada)
Launch of a new pilot to provide flexible debt and equity financing to innovative women-owned tech start-ups emerging from GreenCentre, Bioenterprise and Boundless accelerators (already 12 deals since July)
Delivered the 2025 $30K Pitch to the Chief™ competition as part of our Policetech Accelerator joint initiative with the Cobourg Police Service at Venture13, which was won by Eye3.
The V13 Policetech Accelerator also secured strategic funding from the Province of Ontario’s Rural Economic Development (RED program) as announced by MPP David Piccini, Ontario’s Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training & Skills Development
We secured a remarkable speaker line-up, prepared content and developed fresh new resources for the upcoming "Resiliency Redefined" edition of StrikeUP Canada, our fifth annual digital conference for women entrepreneurship (REGISTER NOW for the February 27th main event), co-presented by Scotiabank Women Initiative® and EDC, in partnership with WEKH, Futurpreneur, BDC, and the Government of Canada's Trade Commissioner Service (along with WBE Canada, Ontario Tech University’s Brilliant Catalyst, and nearly 100 promotional partners).
The community at Venture13 wrapped up an intensive year of extraordinary entrepreneurial programming, workshops, talks and training opportunities spear-headed by Daniel van Kampen and the Town of Cobourg's Economic Development team, along with industrial network-building led by Darla Price from the Northumberland Manufacturers Association (the NMA), and we're grateful to have such a vibrant, permanent facility in Northumberland that supports a wide range of creative and commercial endeavours. Seeing young people get rigorous hands-on experience in the trades onsite at Venture13 was a definite point of inspiration from 2024.
With the support of FedDev Ontario and the Government of Canada, the Community Futures Program (CFP) loan fund here in Northumberland continues to grow and impact small business, with over half of the portfolio represented by women-owned and women-led companies in our community. The CFP has generated an overall growth of 10.4% and an active portfolio ratio of 74%.
Nventure is here to contribute financial momentum to visionary local projects and ventures that will create jobs and growth, building towards a dynamic and exciting future.
Personnel notes:
Our Junior Engineer, Sanjay Deoram, was recruited by MPAC after developing a new automation and software integration system for Nventure
Victoria Pichler, a key driver of Nventure marketing and communications and the launch and success of StrikeUP Canada (you'll remember her as last year's conference M.C.) moved on to Array
We welcomed Daniela Scoppa (Marketing & Communications Coordinator) to the team and Candace Shaw to the Board of Directors.
With a note of confidence and optimism we would like to wish everyone a happy new year and all the best in 2025.
~Nventure.
