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Velocity Foundry
#1
UW’s Velocity Foundry forges new future for hardware startups
September 13, 2014 | Terry Pender | The Record | LINK


Quote:KITCHENER — Tristan Lehari and Darius Gai are working on a prototype of their wearable technology — high-tech goggles that measure a competitive swimmer's performance — while politicians, business people and academics crowd around them.

Their business, TritonWear, is among more than 20 startups in the University of Waterloo's newest technology incubator — the Velocity Foundryin downtown Kitchener.

The Foundry, a home for hardware startups, officially opened on Friday. There is room for 25 startups in the 11,000-square-foot space at 45 Water St. S., and it will be full before the end of next week.

The Foundry is located in part of a former shopping mall — the King Centre — that was built in 1980. The centre was a failed attempt to lure back shoppers who were flocking to suburban malls.

Now, the space occupied by the Foundry is like a 21{+s}t century blast furnace for the new economy. It is a large, bright space with a huge window looking out onto Water Street, high ceilings and white walls. The entrepreneurs work in the open, but there are private meeting rooms. The facility is outfitted with latest equipment to support the startups.

Lehari and Gai listened politely to the speeches by UW president Feridun Hamdullahpur, Kitchener-Waterloo MP Peter Braid and Kitchener-Centre MPP Diaene Vernile, but their minds were on their swimming goggles.

The goggles are equipped with a small square unit that measures an athlete's key metrics, and sends the data to the coach's tablet in real time.

"And it does that for every swimmer in the pool," says Lehari, a varsity swimmer at UW before he graduated from the university's mechatronics program in 2011.

The Triton goggles allow a coach to collect key information on every team member, rather than having to spend time collecting the information from one swimmer at a time.

"All that data, which is currently just lost because there is too much data and too many swimmers, now all that data gets uploaded onto the cloud for long-term tracking and trending," Lehari said.

The Triton unit, which straps onto the back of the goggles, features more than a dozen algorithms that collect data on 12 metrics at a much lower cost than the technology of competitors, Gai said.

The data it measures includes the time it takes to swim the length of the pool, the number of strokes, turnaround time, distance per stroke, cadence, distance under water, stroke profile and velocity profile.

"It is actually really complicated digital-signal processing based on the sensors we have in the device," Gai said.

"You see expensive radar equipment and expensive camera equipment out there to track swimmers," he said. "Our device works with a tablet, right out of the box. It uses Wi-Fi and the device starts working right away in the pool."

Other startups in the Foundry are trying to bring low-cost vision care to poor people, developing automated indoor gardening systems, and working on robots to do commercial floor cleaning.

"We call this the Velocity Foundry because of its focus on hardware, materials and life sciences companies," said Mike Kirkup, director of UW velocity incubators.

The other UW incubator in downtown Kitchener is called the Velocity Garage. Located inside the Tannery building, one block to the west, it is a home for software startups.

"We are extremely excited about the new facility, and about really building on what Velocity can deliver," Kirkup said.

Hamdullahpur said the opening of the Foundry is another demonstration that the UW "is growing in a manner that we are very relevant to the aspirations and needs of our society and the world."

Braid said that "I am willing to bet that the next big thing will start in Kitchener-Waterloo, perhaps right here in this building."
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#2
Great news, but perhaps a single thread combining Velocity Foundry and Velocity Garage?
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#3
panamaniac Wrote:Great news, but perhaps a single thread combining Velocity Foundry and Velocity Garage?
Or maybe even all local start-up incubators.
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#4
Or just put it all in the "Waterloo Region Start Ups" thread?
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#5
Velocity Garage is for software startups and Velocity Foundry for hardware startups. I think it would be nice to track the success of the individual incubators over time.
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#6
rangersfan Wrote:... it would be nice to track the success of the individual incubators over time.

This is one of the biggest data gaps we have (everywhere). My company works with government agencies on policy related to innovation and employment growth and, despite the attention accelerators and incubators get, there's very little quant on what the return on investment is. Communitech has a Deloitte report out that shows a rather phenomenal return. Others across the country and abroader aren't in the same class (hence why you'll see delegations from around the world at Communitech). We're working on a couple of projects that address elements of the data gap but it's not simple math. For the sake of information (and not a plug), you can see more about our work at www.deepcentre.com
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#7
Waterloo startup bringing vision care to the developing world wins big

Nov 28, 2014 | Exchange Magazine | LINK



Quote:Waterloo - Founded by graduates of Systems Design Engineering at Waterloo, EyeCheck is part of the Velocity Foundry. It uses a hardware camera, with which doctors take images of people's eyes and enables them to provide a prescription in a fraction of the usual time. Today's win gives them $25,000 plus the additional $10,000 awarded to hardware or life sciences companies to help cover additional startup costs. Earlier this month, EyeCheck was named one of the top 20 inventions of the year by the James Dyson Foundation.

"Most of the funding will be used to build a robust camera that can stand up to the harsh elements found throughout the developing world," said Daxal Desai, co-founder of EyeCheck. "It will also help us to gather field data at several camps in India where hundreds of people line up to get their vision checked."

During the competition, 10 companies pitched their businesses to a panel of judges representing the investment, startup and business communities. Judges weighed innovation, market potential, market viability and overall pitch.

The following three companies were also grand-prize winners of $25,000 and space at the Velocity Garage and Velocity Foundry:

• Code Connect makes it easy for developers to understand source code.
• HearthStats allows Hearthstone players to easily track wins and losses and gain insight for future play. 
• Perceptiv Labs creates software that allows drones to perceive their environment, track objects and locate themselves on maps.

“Funding for early stage companies is invaluable. The Velocity Fund allows us to provide support to startups and invest in their future through grants,” said Mike Kirkup, director of Velocity. “Velocity, as part of the University of Waterloo, is a leader in the vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem that provides unmatched education, mentorship, networking and additional resources to local startups.”

During the VFF event, an additional 10 teams of University of Waterloo students competed for three new prizes of $5,000 and access to Velocity workspaces. In previous competitions, the amount was $1,000.

The winners of the Velocity $5K are:


• Ansik, the maker of a mechanical reinforcement for worn out gas-charged struts called ShockLock, won Best Pitch.
• Reno, an innovative charging technology that uses body heat to charge devices won $10,000 after winning both Most Innovative and People's Choice.

The judges for the Velocity Fund $25K competition were Ted Livingston of Kik, Mike McCauley of Google, Karamdeep Nijjar of iNovia Capital and Jean-Sebastien Cournoyer of Real Ventures.

The judges for the Velocity Fund $5K competition were Wayne Chang of the Conrad Business, Entrepreneurship and Technology Centre at Waterloo, Geoff Malleck of UWaterloo and Steve McCartney of Communitech.
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#8
I always look forward to the results of the Velocity competitions, it is always great to read about the interesting innovation brewing in the region, this quarter was no different.

Http://betakit.com/cell-collection-menta...-problems/
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#9
The City of Kitchener is supporting the Velocity expansion with $500,000.
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#10
Since Google moved out of the Tannery, the Velocity Foundary has been closed in the Manulife building and merged into the Velocity Garage in the Tannery.
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#11
OK, so can they put a supermarket into the old space now? Smile
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#12
(03-18-2016, 09:56 PM)panamaniac Wrote: OK, so can they put a supermarket into the old space now?  Smile

Manulife's taking it over for offices, I think.
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#13
Velocity's expanded space has officially opened, very exciting news!!

http://www.therecord.com/news-story/6936...kitchener/
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