Canada’s first smart city accelerator – InnoCité MTL – recently announced its next group of startup companies who will participate in an intensive workshop focusing on product-market fit. The 12-week program includes training and practical workshops, access to mentors – including entrepreneurs, corporate executives as well as municipal representatives, individual coaching, prototyping, the development of a local and international commercialization strategy, and the possibility to test their products with the City of Montreal or other InnoCité partners.
The seven startups include:
- Treater: a digital gifting mobile application designed to make gift cards more accessible;
- Rebicycle: building a tailor-made, ecologically responsible alternative to off-the-shelf bicycles;
- SportWhere: a web platform to make booking sport facilities easier;
- Sharebee: a new web platform that connects people with unused space with people who need affordable, convenient, and secure storage or parking solutions;
- Surveyor: a multi-platform initiative meant to make energy optimization accessible to everyone;
- Patterns: using AI, Patterns allows entrepreneurs to find their next location and growth opportunities for their existing and future shops with its web application; and,
- Valegoo: Valegoo allows Montreal drivers to no longer worry about the hassle of parking.
InnoCité MTL selects startups at the go-to-market stage whose urban innovations improve citizen quality of life. Criteria for selection include the quality of the business plan, the potential for growth, and the relevance of the proposed solutions to address urban challenges.
“I wish them the success and development the previous 14 had, as vectors for our city, of economic development and job creation,” said Harout Chitilian, vice president of the City of Montreal’s executive committee, responsible for information technologies and the smart city. “InnoCité MTL thus contributes to the emergence of a fertile soil in which Montréal, smart and digital, takes root.”
