On April 11, pioneering entrepreneurs and business leaders gathered for the second annual CB Innovation Awards Luncheon at the Toronto Region Board of Trade’s contemporary offices and event space on the waterfront. Presented by the signing partner. BMO financial group and thought leadership partner paralucidThe awards luncheon brought attendees together to honor some of Canada’s most innovative companies.
Lunch table sponsors included Air Canada, Canadian Western Bank, Café William, Moderna Canada, Parvis Investments, Qohash, 369 Global, Mastercard Canada, Flygreen and Tricon Residential. The event also coincided with the launch of Canadian BusinessSpring 2024 edition.
In an intimate fireside chat, Fatima Zaidi, co-founder and CEO of award-winning podcast agency Quill, and Katie Green, co-founder of &Or Collective, an apparel brand working to reduce textile waste in the retail industry, discuss They joined Charlotte Herrold. editor-in-chief at Canadian Businessto discuss some of the challenges Canadian entrepreneurs face in growing their businesses, from securing financing to the need for more mentoring opportunities.
In addition to the existing obstacles facing business owners, turbulent market conditions in recent years have created a difficult fundraising environment for entrepreneurs, particularly those who are women and visible minorities, Zaidi and Green noted. “I never want to get to a point in my life where I’m complacent as a CEO or founder,” Zaidi said. “Take the risk, invest in PR… and do what you think you don’t necessarily deserve because of that imposter syndrome.”
In his keynote address, Robin Stewart, COO of BMO’s Canadian commercial banking headquarters, applauded the unique qualities founders must possess to build an innovative business from the ground up: agility, focus, perseverance and drive. “There may be shooting stars like overnight successes, but this is not the reality for 99.9 percent of small business owners,” Stewart said. “Add to that the complexity of technology, the demand to be heard in an already crowded space, and the overwhelming amount of competition, and the path to success is not always clear and it is definitely not easy.”
After lunch hosted by Oliver & Bonacini, speakers Jeff Miller, CEO of Paralucent; Bindhu Alvar Thiruvenkadathan, CIO, BMO Wealth Management; Fardeen Khan, CIO of RBC Wealth Management; and Sladjana Jovanovic, CIO of personal and business banking technology and B2C data transformation at BMO, joined Jason Maghanoy, group editor at SJC, for a marquee panel. Together, they discussed innovation in the financial sector and how technological advances in quantum computing, cybersecurity and generative artificial intelligence will affect the way entrepreneurs run their businesses.
“Our main strategy is digital first, which is to modernize and make our technology more flexible to meet the needs of our customers, and that applies to all of our technology,” Jovanovic said. “So when we think about AI, that’s also our position: How can we use AI to project that?” Miller, who has led Paralucent for more than 20 years, noted that companies tend to focus too much on shiny new technologies, rather than focusing on the impact of their products.
To close the luncheon, Herrold presented awards to the winners of the 2024 CB Innovation Awards. Along with judges Krista Jones, Interim CEO of MaRS Discovery District, and Takara Small, award-winning technology reporter and podcaster, Canadian Business selected 25 finalists from a pool of applicants. From there, the judges narrowed the finalists down to 10 companies that are redefining what it means to innovate. Click here to read about the 2024 CB Innovation Awards winners.