Ontario has a new source for funding as Toronto-based Mantella Venture Partners have announced the formation and launch of a $20M investment fund to support early stage technology ventures in Ontario. Mantella Venture Partners is a collaboration between Basecamp Labs, a private early stage technology accelerator, and Mantella Corporation, an established family-owned commercial and residential real estate developer in the Greater Toronto Area.

The company is managed by Robin Axon and Duncan Hill, who are the founding partners of Basecamp Labs which is the accelerator that works with Mantella Venture Partners.

“For the past few years, we’ve seen a steady decline in Canadian venture capital deal flow, the number of VC-backed firms, and the average investment size,” says Axon. “In fact, according to a recent CVCA report on the industry, investment levels in 2009 were the lowest they’ve been in 13 years.”

“But innovation is still thriving,” says Hill. “With the venture market in such a state of flux, the timing could not be better for the launch of a new fund that is focused on both early-stage investing and providing the hands-on support entrepreneurs need to ensure market success.”

Mantella will be looking to invest in early stage mobile and Internet software companies, their portfolio already includes Chango, an ad buying platform for direct response advertisers; and Pushlife, a mobile entertainment platform for mobile operators.

Duncan Hill was the Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Think Dynamics, a developer of data centre automation software that was acquired by IBM in May 2003. He spent two years at IBM driving strategy for early enterprise cloud computing. Most recently, Hill served as Entrepreneur in Residence at Ventures West; was an independent director for RapidMind (acq. by Intel August ‘09); and was executive advisor to Opalis (acq. by Microsoft December ‘09). He currently serves on the Chango board of directors and on executive advisory boards at Pushlife, ServiceMesh, Cirba, Embotics, and the Velocity program at the University of Waterloo.

Prior to founding Basecamp Labs with Duncan Hill, Robin Axon was a partner at Ventures West on the IT and communications team. Before that, Axon was at MD Robotics (formerly Spar Aerospace) and the Canadian Space Agency, where he helped to prepare the Canadarm2 for installation onto the International Space Station. Axon has served on the boards of a number of technology companies including: QuickPlay Media, RapidMind (acq. by Intel August ‘09), AudienceView, Fortiva (acq. by Proofpoint ‘08), Chantry Networks (acq. by Seimens ‘03), Belair Networks and Instrumar.
About Mantella Venture Partners.

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MySpace has had an interesting journey ever since it was founded back in 2003, with a number of senior management changes came a change in the company’s direction, and they also shut down their entire Canadian operations in June 2009. However they still have well over 100,000 million user accounts.  Advertising network Olive Media and MySpace have extended their relations which will now make Olive Media the exclusive advertising network for MySpace in Canada, giving advertisers access to a premium level of Canadian inventory and custom executions nationally.

“Providing marketers and advertisers with premium products and audiences to achieve their marketing goals is our top priority,” said Theresa Smith, Vice President of Product, Olive Media. “Our experience with MySpace in the Quebec market has proven that advertisers are eager to custom integrate their brand with MySpace’s highly targeted and deeply engaged audience, and we are thrilled to be able to offer this to our clients all across Canada.”

Another good win for Olive, but I have a feeling the battle of advertising networks in Canada is just beginning…

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With the Speech from the Throne behind us many organizations around the country are prepared for the new focus and budgets that have been allocated to their respetive sector. The Council of Ontario Universities (COU) are looking to take on the challenge of bring a higher level of eduction to Ontario students head on as they have set ambitious goals for increasing domestic and international enrolment as well as developing an online university, and Ontario universities are up to the task of tackling these goals.

“We look forward to working with the government to address the growing numbers of students seeking university education and to contribute to the province’s goal of ensuring that 70% of the population attains higher education,” said Sheldon Levy, Chair of Council and President of Ryerson University. “Ontario universities stepped up and accommodated over 100,000 new students over the past five years with the funding provided by the province’s Reaching Higher plan,” said Levy.

Ontarios wil work with government bodies to enhance efforts to recruit students, implement exchanges, foster research partnerships and internationalize domestic curriculum. Over the past decade, the volume of international students recruited to Ontario universities has tripled to over 26,000 students and this success provides an excellent platform to take on the stated challenge of increasing international enrolment by a further 50%.

“We are happy to enhance our international activities and to work with the government to explore how to leverage the online learning solutions of our institutions into the development of an online university,” said Bonnie M. Patterson, President of COU. “Universities already have many online learning solutions and an online collaborative operation called the Scholars Portal, which provides digital journals for research and course materials for over four million university students and faculty in Ontario.”

The COU has already begun the work on a multi-year plan that will look to help the universities across Ontario reach this new goal, which is now backed by a financial commitment from the government.

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There was a lot of buzz over the last few days on the internet about a blog post from Erick Schonfeld (TechCrunch) where he interviewed Marc Andressen and Marc’s comments were to “Burn the boats.” This referring to the legend from the 1500’s when Cortes landed in Mexico who’s attitude was all or nothing; to move forward with no possibility of changing your mind or going back. Andreessen who has the Founder of Netscape and have gone on to a number of other successful ventures and now invests in technology companies probably knows a thing or two about what he’s talking about. After all Netscape was one of the first big successes on the Internet.
It is no secret that traditional media, specifically newspapers have been struggling for years, now many of them or playing with pay wall models as they try to recoup some of the lost revenues they had become accustomed to from advertising. Consumers of course don’t necessarily want to pay for content, or do they? While some consumers will be willing to pay there will never be enough to replace the revenue dollars that newspapers have become accustomed to from advertising.

Does the newspaper industry understand technology?

According to the post by Eric:

“Microsoft is going through this right now,” he points out, “Ballmer is not complaining about it.” He’s tackling it head on. So did Intel when Andy Grove gutted it to shift from memory chips to microprocessors. So does every technology company CEO. It is ingrained in the industry Andreessen comes from, so it is just obvious to him: “You are cruising along, and then technology changes. You have to adapt.” Media companies need to learn that lesson fast. To the extent that their products are now delivered and consumed as digital bits, they too are becoming technology companies.

Looking at media companies across the country it is often a top down problem, where upper management does not take the time to understand technology’s impact on business models and does not empower their employers to make the necessarily changes or even to implement a pilot project to test the waters. The politics of change can often be so enormous that it simple chokes innovation and the company is dead in the water, or as we’ve seen with CanWest in the last few months get to a point of bankruptcy.

According to Seth Godin who was in Toronto for SES a few years ago, he suggested to implement a pilot project, as it is easier to ask for forgiveness on something small than to ask for permission on something that is big (or perceived big).

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Astral Media Radio recently announced a new long-term agreed with Emmis Interactive, Inc., that will allow the radio division to leverage Emmis’ interactive platform and help deliver a better experience for radio listeners. The new agreement is an extension of existing projects between the two entities but shows a dedication to the interactive side lead by Philippe Patrice, Chief Digital Strategies Officer for Astral Media Radio.

“Astral is proud of the work done over the last few years online and with mobile, but our deal with Emmis marks a new chapter in our commitment to capitalize on the amazing growth of digital media,” said Jacques Parisien, Group President, Astral Media Radio and Astral Media Outdoor: “Partnering with Emmis will allow us to take a huge leap forward in terms of our online product, by building more robust and engaging sites for our strong radio brands. This is a critical element of our Interactive strategy; we are very focused on making Interactive a strong and important part of our business.”

Emmis Interactive’s BaseStation will be used by Astral, the tool also helps clients increase engagement and create two-way communication possibilities between the station and the audience.

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Bombardier Recreational Products Inc. (BRP), who designs, developments, manufactures, distributes motorised recreational vehicles has launched a new online retails store at www.store.ski-doo.com.
The new consumer site is open for business, and genuine Ski-Doo parts, accessories, and clothing can now be purchased online and shipped anywhere in Canada and the United States.

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Panasonic Canada has just launched 2 new G-series camera to add to their line up of digital cameras. The LUMIX DMC-G2 and LUMIX DMC-G10 have hit the streets and now available to Canadians.

The LUMIX G2 is the successor to the LUMIX G1 and is the world’s first digital interchangeable lens system camera with a touch-control, movable LCD.

Other features of the LUMIX G2 include:

• shoots 720p High Definition video using the AVCHD Lite format
• latest models in the LUMIX G Micro System.
• touch-screen operation, consumers can snap photos by simply touching the LCD screen
• records 1280 x 720 HD videos in the AVCHD Lite format
• advanced audio options – sound is recorded with Dolby Digital Creator and an optional accessory stereo microphone can be attached.
• Wind Cut function further enhances sound, reducing noise caused from background wind
• 12.1-megapixel Live MOS sensor

The LUMIX DMC-G10 is the world’s lightest digital interchangeable lens camera with a viewfinder. Compact and easy-to-use, the LUMIX G10 shoots high-quality photos and HD video.

Other features of the LUMIX DMC-G10 include:

• digital interchangeable lens camera with a viewfinder
• can record High Definition (HD) video in addition to high-quality still images
• LUMIX G VARIO 14-42mm/F3.5-5.6 ASPH/MEGA O.I.S. lens which offers a versatile zoom range of 14-42mm (35mm camera equivalent: 28-84mm)
• record 1280 x 720 HD video in Motion JPEG, QVGA, VGA and WVGA formats.

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Toronto-based Seawell Networks has secured $7million in a Series A round of financing led by BDC Capital and included Northwater Intellectual Property Fund and Ontario Centres of Excellence. Seawell is a provider of Internet video distribution products which they have been working on since their launch in 2008.  The company will use this round of financing to further expand their development and marketing marketing efforts.

SeaWell has the three key ingredients for success – a world-class team of proven entrepreneurs, an innovative solution and a large market opportunity with a highly compelling value proposition,” said Northwater Vice President and current SeaWell director, Andrew Harrison. “We look forward to continued work with the team to establish SeaWell as the new standard for online media streaming.”

Nazmin Alani, Managing Director, Venture Capital, BDC Capital will join the SeaWell Board of Directors.
Source: TechCrunch

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In the “unexpected” corner, it looks like BCAA Insurance has added a new policy for their customers who want to add insurance for their mobile devices.  According to their press release “For as little as $3 a month per device, you can protect your family’s mobile phones and MP3 players from loss, theft, and even accidental damage like dropping your phone or spilling coffee. There are no deductibles to pay, and you’re covered should you lose or damage your cell phone or MP3 player.”

With the price points of mobile devices I’m not convinced this makes good business sense for the customer or for BCAA Insurance (in the long term), but I’m sure they see this as a hook or up sell on their current policies.  Thoughts?

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Here are a few upcoming events taking place across Canada that might be of interest:

F5 Expo – April 7

F5 EXPO is a forward thinking resource meant to jump start businesses into “the know” on future trends within the online space.

F5 Expo – Registration

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