Four months after opening nominations for its Entrepreneur of the Year award, which is meant to recognize Canada’s top entrepreneurs, Ernst & Young has released the regional finalists of the awards.
The finalists are split into the regions of Québec, Ontario, Prairies, Pacific, and Atlantic, and further split into categories according to company vertical (such as FinTech and consumer tech).
An independent panel of judges will name winners in each category, and one of the category winners will take the title of overall winners for each region. That winner will then compete with winners from each region for the Canadian Entrepreneur Of The Year title.
The Canadian winner will go on to compete with winners from more than 50 countries for the title of EY World Entrepreneur Of The Year, in June 2017.
The non-exhaustive list (full list can be found here) of finalists include:
Ontario
Young & Emerging
Toronto
Ray Cao, Eva Chan, Daniel Rodic, and Elena Sahakyan, Exact Media Network Inc.
Michael Kathen, Wealthsimple
London
Taylor Ablitt, GoViral Inc
Oakville
Daniel Bartek, Robert Besant, and Cam McDonald, Iconic Brewing Company
Technology
Kitchener-Waterloo Region
Dave Kroetsch, Aeryon Labs Inc.
Kurtis McBride, Miovision Technologies Inc.
Toronto
Alex Miller, Esri Canada
Kanata
Craig Betts, Solace Systems
Québec
Technology and communications
Montréal
Jean-François Côté, District M
Québec
Martin Thériault, Eddyfi
Saint-Laurent
Jim Alexopoulos, Stanex
Emerging entrepreneur
Montréal
Adrian Schauer, AlayaCare
Québec
Mathieu Beauchesne and Olivier Marcotte, Nucleom
François Thériault, Surmesur
Prairies
Technology and communications
Calgary
Bryan de Lottinville, Benevity, Inc.
Edmonton
Kelly Kimo, Production World Inc.
Winnipeg
James Giesbrecht, Rick Kuffel, Trevor Maguire and Rudi Wierckx, RTDS Technologies Inc.
Saskatoon
Amit Gupta, Solido Design Automation Inc.
Pacific
FinTech
Vancouver
Cody Green, Canada Drives
David Gens, Merchant Advance Capital Ltd.
Hamed Shahbazi, TIO Networks Corp.
Consumer technology
Port Coquitlam
Ryan Peterson and Trent Shumay, Finger Food Studios
Kelowna
Lance Priebe, Hyper Hippo Productions Ltd.
Vancouver
Sean Clark and Roger Hardy, Shoes.com
Atlantic
Information technology
Halifax
Saar Fabrikant, B4Checkin
Travis McDonough, Kinduct Technologies Inc.
St. John’s
Todd Hiscock, Beaufort Solutions Inc.
Mount Pearl
Russell Pelley, GRi Simulation Inc