Sparking imaginations
Four early-stage knowledge companies earn seed funding through Spark Cape Breton competition
Shea Munro was in the shower when he heard the good news delivered in an email alert on his phone Thursday morning.
His hard work, along with that of his partner Krysta MacIntosh, to devise a mobile app to aid athletes and everyday folks in reaching the correct posture and positions in workout routines has finally started to pay dividends. The company they are looking to grow, TrAIner, was awarded $50,000 through Innovacorp’s Spark Cape Breton innovation competition.
“I saw an opportunity and that sort of gap in the market and we’re just looking to make the most of it,” Munro said.
His business partner and girlfriend, MacIntosh, said the app offers what other mobile exercise programs don’t — instructing proper techniques in exercising and rehabilitation as a video is captured of the user working out in real time.
The app will pinpoint where the user is going wrong in the exercise and how to make the necessary corrections.
Munro, 31, a personal trainer based in Sydney, was shortlisted for the competition last year but wasn’t able to garner seed funding.
He said he’s hoping to now work with MacIntosh in further developing the app and eventually having it accepted for download onto the Apple and Android platforms.
“We’re going to use a lot of (the funding) for either continuing education for myself and Krysta to take additional machine writing courses or to apply to certain grant opportunities where we can hire on a machine writing engineer,” he said.
“Right now, our base is just enough to get us to a point where we can show that this is feasible but we’re going to need additional people on board to make it a consumer product.”
Another startup on the eightcompany shortlist was MINDSENTINEL — a mobile app that acts sort of like a “check engine light” on one’s mental health.
North Sydney resident Dave Johnson also earned $50,000 to move ahead with his project that would assist users in bringing attention to one’s change in mood and behaviours.
Johnson said the app will pick up on what would be considered unusual activity for the user of the mobile device.
“If for a six-month period from 12 a.m. to 5 a.m. I don’t use my phone and then suddenly there are instances where you start to see activity at three o’clock or four o’clock in the morning — times when you should be sleeping — it may be an indicator that something is not going well,” he said.
The app will be able to establish patterns if the user is “feeling good, feeling healthy and they’re out with their friends, exercising and sleeping well,” Johnson noted.
He said it would also monitor the frequency of text messaging to family and friends to pick up on any changes in social interactions over time.
The next step for MINDSENTINEL is to bring on additional expertise from the health profession. He’ll be looking to attract more funding to hire a psychologist and someone with a software design background.
“Privacy and security are huge issues, and rightly so, but we’ll do our best going forward on that and get expertise in that area as well.”
The other winners were Commlet – a company owned by Patsy Leadbeater of Sydney, who received a $25,000 grant for her mobile app that works with GPS bracelets to assist schools in keeping tabs on children while on outdoor field trips.
Another $50,000 prize went to Matthew T. Gillis of River Ryan who is developing VMOpro, an exercise and monitoring tool for knee rehabilitation for use at home and in physiotherapy settings. The provincial government through Innovacorp and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency each contributed $350,000 toward this year’s competition.
The province was subdivided into four regions – Spark Halifax, Spark West, Spark North and Spark Cape Breton, attracting a total of 122 submissions.
The eight shortlisted companies pitched to the judges in the Cape Breton region in June, which had a total budget of $175,000.
Innovacorp’s regional manager for Cape Breton and northern Nova Scotia Bob Pelley said the winners were “four strong companies” but there’s also help for those who didn’t earn seed funding this time out.
“There are other great companies in the works that we’re also going to continue to work with,” he said.