This week, several Canadian startups have made announcements, launching new products, partnerships, and more. Here’s the latest on Canada’s movers and shakers.
TransPod announces partnership with railway expert IKOS for hyperloop development
Toronto-based TransPod, a startup that is dedicated to creating a hyperloop system, has announced a partnership with IKOS, a technology consulting firm that specializes in railway engineering and energy infrastructure.
IKOS’ team will provide support to TransPod by focusing on the design and development of its hyperloop, which is scheduled to be commercially ready by the year 2020. To add its support to TransPod’s teams located in Canada and Italy, IKOS will also open new offices in those countries later this year.
“Hyperloop transportation will change the way we live, commute, and conduct business,” said Sebastien Gendron, the founder and CEO of TransPod. “Our goal is to introduce this change around the world. With the addition of IKOS’ extensive experience, we’re uniquely positioned to accelerate the development of industry-leading hyperloop technologies that will significantly improve our quality of life and economic prosperity.”
In November 2016, TransPod secured $20 million in seed funding from Italy-based Angelo Investments to continue supporting its efforts to create a hyperloop.
Absolute launches new product and appoints new VP of sales
Vancouver-based Absolute, which provides endpoint security and data risk management solutions, has announced the launch of Application Persistence, a new product meant to help IT and security leaders with endpoint management.
The company said its new product will bring self-healing capabilities to third-point endpoint controls, and enable IT and security leaders to ensure that endpoint management and security applications remain visible to IT departments. Application Persistence will also repair breaches by recognizing and remediating issues in real-time to restore security posture across all endpoints, and keep off-network devicesvisible so organizations can connect to devices regardless of location.
“Organizations under constant attack demand a resilient self-healing endpoint defense,” said Christopher Bolin, the CPO at Absolute. “We believe the world is more secure when all endpoint agents can repair themselves. We are opening up our competitive advantage to empower third-party apps to self-heal, creating a united front against persistent attackers and insider threats. No other company can do this.”
The company also announced that Todd Chronert, a former VP of Global Channel Sales at RSA, will be joining Absolute as VP of Americas sales.
In this role, Chronert will focus on driving Absolute’s sales strategy and manage teams responsible for both direct and indirect sales across the Americas.
“There are thousands of vendors vying for the attention of a finite number of buyers, the solutions that win add exponential value over their legacy controls, help them prove the value and compliance of existing investments, and boost staff productivity. I joined Absolute because that is exactly what we do,” said Chronert. “Its world-class leaders, talent, and advisers have cracked the code on self-healing endpoint security to keep pace with the evolving threat landscape.”
Equibit Development Corporation sells $250,000 worth in equibits
Equibit Development Corporation (EDC), a Toronto-based blockchain platform for issuing, trading, and managing public and private equity, announced that it sold $250,000 worth in equibits on February 1.
EDC specializes in the safe issuing of shares and protecting trades from hacks. Its applications combine Bitcoin protocols with the company’s own blockchain (equibits) to provide clients with a secure peer-to-peer trading platform.
EDC, which started the sale with an initial offering of 100,000 equibits priced at $2 per coin, has offered to sell one million equibits out of a total of 22 million potentially available equibits until March 31st. The sale will follow a predetermined schedule, with the price of equibits increasing with each subsequent batch. Purchased equibits will be sent to user’s accounts on EDC’s web-wallet service.
“We’re off to an incredible start. Over 120,000 equibits have been sold so far,” said Chris Horlacher, the CEO of EDC. “This shows the strong support we’re getting from the community and will only get stronger as events unfold over the next two months.”
Equibit recently found itself in hot water after announcing that John McAfee was joining the team as chief security officer — though McAfee later denied the claim. McAfee clarified that his role was in advising the board, and that he would continue in this role. Horlacher said the matter was due to US press outlets misunderstanding the company’s press release.
The company plans to use proceeds from the sale of equibits to expand EDC’s team of developers, accelerate product development, expand the network of equibit supporters, install enterprise infrastructure, and market Equibit blockchain applications.