WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE - L-SPARK Enters the World of Corporate Accelerators
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APRIL 2019
WESLEY CLOVER
QUARTERLY UPDATE
L-SPARK Enters
the World of
Corporate
Accelerators
Echosec Intends to
Make the Darknet
a Little Less Dark
Looking Backward and
Forward at the Latest
Investment Trends ❯
Moving Fast
Table of in a Changing
Contents Environment
Welcome to another issue of Q. The first
Quarter of 2019 is already behind us,
amazingly, and the business activities for
me and the companies I am involved with
2 Message from the Chairman continue at a rapid pace. In this issue, we
take a look back at last year as well as ahead importance in the pending next generation
3 L-Spark
to the year well underway. of mobile networks and the Internet of
4 Alacrity Global Things (IoT) that will leverage them.
5 Tutela As you will read, investment activity in
most parts of the world continues to climb. These recent moves and others bode well
5 Echosec
Innovation races forward. Opportunities for for the companies involved with L-SPARK.
6 Martello investment and growth keep increasing. In Similarly, as the healthcare sector currently
6 Celtic Manor Resort step with this, competition is getting more ranks as the second-most attractive industry
intense. And geo-political developments for US VC investments (read the article
7 Solink
are serving to stir the business pots more inside), we expect good things for start-
8 Segmentify than usual. Investors are taking closer looks ups such as our own Cliniconex. And the
9 ProntoForms at where they put their funds, and biasing valuable intellectual property developed
9 ICC Wales much of their activity toward later-stage by all the portfolio companies provides a
start-ups seeking larger financing to be potential starting point for further innovation
11 Editorial: The Latest Venture concentrated on market expansion efforts. and partnering relationships for the new
Capital Activities and Trends companies being formed under the Alacrity
12 Alacrité France This is the environment the Technology global start-up program in places including
portfolio is operating in for 2019 and beyond. France, Turkey, India, Mexico and beyond.
13 English Ninjas
I feel good, however, about the steps the
14 Cliniconex companies are taking. For example, Artificial The Wesley Clover companies in the Real
15 InitLive Intelligence (AI) is an emerging technology Estate portfolio continue to attract and
disrupting so many industries. Portfolio retain tenants and guests, and grow business
15 ThinkRF
companies such as Tutela, Solink and many accordingly. In the UK, the grand opening of
16 Wesley Clover Parks others are embedding these capabilities into the impressive new International Convention
18 AirVM their product offerings now to ensure they Centre Wales is getting ever closer, and
remain leaders in their markets. everything appears to be lining up nicely for
19 Benbria
a successful launch.
21 Enjovia Wesley Clover SaaS Accelerator L-SPARK has
23 Mitel recently embraced an additional business So things are going well. I hope you enjoy
24 Company Index model, wherein they are partnering to reading the details in this issue of Q as much
build individual ‘Corporate’ Accelerators as as I enjoy sharing them. Thank you for your
well. The first of these has a heavy focus on interest in Wesley Clover and the businesses I
Q is a quarterly publication of Wesley Autonomous Vehicles and the development am involved in around the globe.
Clover, highlighting some of the latest
accomplishments from the wide range of a new ecosystem of start-ups addressing
of businesses in our portfolio. Visit the emerging space. The second new Kind Regards,
wesleyclover.com for more information. Accelerator has a focus on security and its Terry Matthews, Chairman
❮ 2 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019
WESLEY CLOVER L-SPARK
LAUNCHES NEW CORPORATE
ACCELERATORS
L-SPARK, the leading SaaS Accelerator in BlackBerry/L-SPARK Corporate Accelerator.
Canada, has been busy developing new This partnership is focused on creating
partnerships to build upon their legacy of innovative new solutions that leverage the
helping innovative companies spring onto Blackberry QNX software platform. Among
the Canadian and global technology stage. the applications, BlackBerry QNX is the most
And the scope for the next start-ups they are successful platform for building secure
working with is impressive. software solutions in the connected and
autonomous vehicle market. Under the new
Before we look forward, let’s look at some partnership, BlackBerry will help start-ups
of the recent accomplishments. The port- research and develop product prototypes
folio of companies who have passed event continues to grow each year, and plan- in not just autonomous vehicle applications,
through L-SPARK programs, plus the four in ning for the 2019 show is well underway. but also in the areas of robotics, device secu-
the current program, has now reached 47. rity, sensor fusion (e.g. LiDAR, radar, cameras
Just under half of those companies have Sticking with events, January saw the team and GPS), functional safety, analytics and
now accomplished the primary mandate conduct SaaS Showcase Toronto once again, medical devices.
of the program, which is to secure external bringing the current cohort and other invited
funding. A total of $30.1M of new invest- companies to the key Toronto investment This represents a shift in Accelerator mis-
ment has been raised to date. This time one and start-up scene. Attendance exceeded sion, emphasizing first products over rev-
year ago, that number was $16.8M, which expectations and several of the companies enue and sales, but it is an approach both
means almost half the new total was raised who presented continue to have follow-on partners want given the early state of these
during the last 12 months. This suggests the discussions with those important audiences. application markets. L-SPARK and BlackBerry
investment community is paying ever closer announced the first seven companies to
attention. That event was replicated in Ottawa, with join the new six-month Accelerator program
the biggest showcase to-date. More than recently. The first cohort includes portfolio
To ensure the start-ups are well supported, 500 guests came out to support the family of company Martello, cybersecurity firm Bluink
L-SPARK struck new partnerships with both start-ups, and expectations remain high for and automotive software developer Evolved
Stripe and Intercom late in 2018, and also some attractive outcomes from the pitches. Vehicles Environments, plus four other com-
strengthened existing relationships with panies from across Canada. The hard work is
Microsoft, Amazon, Google and others. So what next? We can guess how transfor- already underway.
These partners and the value-added services mative the emerging autonomous vehicles
they provide are key to better enabling the industry will be. We can sense the import- Another program L-SPARK is committed to
start-ups for success. ance of next generation wireless networks for 2019 is turning their Female Founders and
and IoT devices. We know how critical cyber- Funders event into an annual occurrence.
While a couple months have passed already, security will be in these developments. In This year, they are looking to partner with
it is worth noting the 2018 version of the addition to the ongoing SaaS Accelerator, others in the Ottawa ecosystem to make it
flagship L-SPARK industry event, SAAS L-SPARK has recently established key new more inclusive and robust. 2018 was a strong
NORTH, attracted more than 1,200 delegates partnerships that enable the team to partici- year for L-SPARK and for the Canadian tech
to Ottawa to hear from industry experts, pate actively in these emerging industries. and start-up ecosystem. And there are plenty
network with some of the fastest growing of reasons for even more optimism as 2019
SaaS companies, and learn how to scale their The first of the new relationships to be rolls on. l-spark.com
businesses in a globally competitive way. The unveiled publicly is the launch of the
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 3 ❯
The Latest Round-Up From Alacrity Global
The Alacrity Global team provided the following data as a summary
of the scale and progress of the Wesley Clover start-up fund initiative
to date — an evolving program with a global reach.
Investments Under
Management*
$50,000,000
Canada Cumulative 2018
UK
Revenues*
France Austria
Turkey
>$25,000,000
China
Mexico
India
Active Start-Ups
Active Funds
Funds Recently Launched
Singapore
30
Funds Under Consideration
Funds Seeking Additional LP’s Start-Ups with
Follow-on
Investment
10
Start-Ups Seeking Investment
Cliniconex English Ninjas Segmentify Twentify * Estimated
Corporate 16% Turkey 20%
Series A 4% L-Spark 6%
Other 6%
Pre-Seed 46% UK 2%
Wesley Clover 26%
Pre-Series A 12%
Private 15% Government 37%
Seed 38% Canada 72%
Investment Composition Investment Stage Revenue Composition
❮ 4 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019
TUTELA BUILDS MORE performance, optimize and maintain cus- replayed in key industry media, including a
tomer services, and ensure their investment piece in FierceWireless.
MOMENTUM IN 2019 and upgrade strategies continue to align
The latest Quarter continued the rapid with their market and customer needs. Groundwork laid at the end of 2018 is sup-
growth for portfolio member Tutela, the porting the ambitious strategy Tutela has
mobile device experience measurement As a way to keep network benchmarking embarked on for 2019, including plans to
company. The team secured a number front-and-center for its target customers, launch services in Asia, the Middle East and
of large new business deals, including a Tutela recently introduced a primary new Oceania, as well as to continue growth in
global agreement with Telefonica that will metric, called Consistent Quality. Rather than markets across Europe, North and South
see Tutela SaaS used as the standard for measuring ‘potential’ network speed, this America. Just in the last month, Tutela has
customer experience measurement across new metric helps quantify the actual levels launched successful marketing campaigns
the global Telefonica operations. Tutela also and quality of service that users experience. in the Nordic region and in South-East
deepened their partnership with Millicom This data gives operators an accurate and Asia, securing initial customer trials in both
(operating under the TIGO brand) with an balanced understanding of that customer regions. On the product development side of
agreement to extend the initial, successful experience, and help guide decisions around the business, the company recently launched
deployment of the software in the region to everything from marketing to competitive an updated SDK (software development kit)
a full roll-out that will encompass seven Latin positioning to support to infrastructure that will now collect metrics on mobile video
American countries. upgrade policies. quality as well as voice connectivity.
Tutela user experience data, currently The Consistent Quality feature was released Exceeding the growth Tutela achieved in
sourced from more than 250 million devices along with the successful Tutela 2018 US 2018 will not be easy, but with additional
worldwide, provides the most comprehen- Mobile LTE Network Quality Report, which global resources and a growing industry rep-
sive picture of mobile end-user connectivity. marks the next step in the content market- utation, the company is confident they have
Network operators use this information to ing strategy the company has embraced. what it takes to do just that. tutela.com
benchmark and monitor their infrastructure This report gained added reach by being
ECHOSEC SHINES LIGHT also used to protect online dissidents from similar to that of Google. It operates without
ON THE DARKNET political reprisal, facilitate news leaks or
whistle-blowing, and circumvent govern-
the need for the existing Tor Darknet browser.
This past Quarter, the team at Echosec ment imposed network censorship. Beacon is the most recent addition to an
added a major new offering to their SaaS Echosec portfolio focused evermore on the
portfolio. In addition to the existing loca- The Darknet is architected to listen to and Enterprise customer. And this strategic shift
tion-based social media data aggregation receive information from the open Internet, has resulted in an impressive 340% growth
and intelligence platform, the company and enable the exchange of messages and in company revenues over the past year. To
launched ‘Beacon’, a proprietary new search other content, but to do so anonymously. keep this momentum going, the team is busy
tool that enables users to navigate the The computer servers connected to the with a full conference schedule over the next
Darknet quickly and easily. Darknet don’t appear on any network lists Quarter, exhibiting at RSA San Francisco, pre-
and don’t respond to detection techniques senting at the ESRI Canada Security Summit
Darknet is an umbrella term used to describe such as pinging or other inquiries. As a result, in Ottawa in May, and exhibiting at the NRF
the encrypted portions of the Internet not they remain ‘hidden’ or ‘dark’, and the content Protect conference in Anaheim in June.
open to public view, as well as hidden net- they contain cannot be indexed or searched Offering a dynamic, online data intelligence
works whose architecture is superimposed in any of the established ways. engine with the ability to surface key data
on top of the Internet. It is considered by from social media posts, blogs, news feeds
many to be part of the Deep Web, and is For legitimate enterprises, this can repre- and now the Deep Web and Darknet, the
often associated with illicit online activities sent an area of online exposure and threat. Echosec message is definitely making waves.
such as hosting unsavory or illegal informa- Echosec has designed Beacon as a pow- We expect to share more strong results
tion, facilitating the sale of restricted goods erful tool to investigate and mitigate such going forward. echosec.net
such as arms trading, or hosting illegal mar- threats. Beacon is an extension to the exist-
ketplaces such as the infamous Silk Road ing Echosec platform, and is a fully indexed
online drug bazaar. On the other hand, it is Darknet search engine with a user interface
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 5 ❯
MARTELLO GROWTH
ACCELERATES FOLLOWING
IPO, NEXT ACQUISITION
Ottawa-based Martello closed 2018 ready
for continued growth after debuting on the
TSX Venture Exchange, acquiring IT Analytics
software provider Savision and bolstering
the company leadership team before year
end. The mission remains set on bringing
clarity and control to complex digital envi-
ronments, with products that monitor, man-
age and help optimize IT infrastructure.
The acquisition of Savision in November
2018 brought added IT and network per-
formance management capabilities to the
portfolio. Savision software allows users selected recently to participate in the new Sullivan with a Price and Value Leadership
to visualize IT management data such as BlackBerry/L-SPARK Accelerator Program. Award for NPM (Network Performance
performance metrics, outage details and BlackBerry/QNX is now teaming with Management). The IEEE presented Martello
other incident information. The acquisition Martello to research and develop high per- with the Outstanding Information &
also added key European sales resources to formance services to support the Internet of Communications Technology Company
the company, and enabled former Savision Things (IoT), including the rapidly emerging (ICT) Recognition Award. And the company
CEO Stefanie Richheimer to join the Martello world of autonomous vehicles. also accepted two awards from the Best
leadership team as Chief Revenue Officer. Ottawa Business Awards (BOBs) for “Deals of
These developments are adding to a list the Year: Private Equity” and “Best Business”.
As the product offerings continue to expand, that is providing the company with very
so does the ability to solve complex net- positive industry recognition. Martello A strong run of recent success indeed,
work issues, such as those associated with was the first Ottawa-headquartered tech- and we look forward to more to come.
the Internet of Things (IoT). To that point, nology company to go public since 2015. martellotech.com
Martello was one of six Canadian companies The technology was recognized by Frost &
CELTIC MANOR RESORT including The Belfry (Silver Award winner)
and Chewton Glen (Bronze Award winner),
to be named Best UK Hotel once again. What
is most pleasing about this award is that it
WINS BEST UK HOTEL to retain the coveted top recognition. is voted for by the industry professionals
who are our conference and events clients.
AWARD, AGAIN More than 1,300 guests attended the Awards It is reassuring to know we are regarded for
gala dinner, held at the Battersea Evolution exceeding their expectations. This award is
The Celtic Manor Resort has once again and hosted by TV presenter Gethin Jones. thanks to our entire Resort team who work
been named the Best Hotel in the UK at the Highlights of the evening included a special hard to make such achievements possible.”
prestigious Meetings and Incentive Travel welcome from Only Boys Aloud, and a
Awards gala in London. The five-star venue celebration of Wales that included singer Mr. Edwards continued, “It was a fantastic
in South Wales regained the Gold Award and Sian Evans belting out the hit track, Louder. way to cap the night we formally announced
has now been voted the Best Hotel eight to the UK meetings industry the ICC Wales as
times in the last nine years! Confirming its In receiving the Award, Celtic Manor Resort a new venue and Wales as a destination for
position as the leading destination for events Chief Executive Ian Edwards said: “This has business events. All the industry movers and
in the UK, the resort held off strong com- been another amazing year of business shakers were in attendance.”
petition from five other shortlisted venues, growth at Celtic Manor and we are delighted
❮ 6 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019
The International Convention Centre Wales
will include a 4,000 square metre pillar-free
main hall, a 1,500-seated auditorium, 12 flex-
ible meeting rooms, a double-height glass
atrium and a 2,500 square metre outdoor
plaza. The Celtic Manor Resort complements
the new venue with its existing four hotels,
10 executive Hunter Lodges, three champi-
onship golf courses, seven restaurants, luxury
spas and team-building adventure activities.
The combined facilities are located at
Junction 24 of the M4 motorway, just two
hours by road or rail from London. They cre-
ate a unique environment for holding con-
ferences and events. celtic-manor.com
Solink Secures $16.3M to accelerate its current growth path and meet Solink is capitalizing on the inherent yet
increasing demand for its technology. untapped value of several existing business
Grow Business Intelligence systems. By synchronizing and adding intel-
Platform Also participating in the oversubscribed ligence to the terabytes of data captured by
round were existing investors Generation Point-of-Sale (POS) and video surveillance
Portfolio company Solink continues to Ventures, ScaleUp Ventures and BDC IT systems, raw data is transformed into a tool
evolve their disruptive SaaS platform, inte- Venture fund. The new money will be used for business insight and action. Clients now
grating client surveillance and transaction to grow the development and sales teams as use Solink technology for daily inventory
data into a single user-friendly dashboard well as the customer support organization. auditing, health and safety monitoring, sus-
that combines detailed images and infor- picious transaction, shoplifting and other
mation from key business activities, includ- In commenting on the new investment, Jon loss-prevention investigations, and more.
ing monetary, customer service, health and Shulkin, a partner at Valor Equity Partners
safety and other engagements. said, “We are excited to be partnering with The Solink platform allows managers to
Solink. We began our relationship with the spend less time scrolling through video
And market demand continues to grow. company as customers through a portfo- footage to find what they need. It highlights
Brick-and-mortar businesses of all types lio company of ours, and immediately saw specific incidents that require attention, and
today are evolving. They must, in order to value in the Solink platform. The team com- gives users the whole picture in a single click
meet customer expectations that are higher mitment to innovation and customer expe- of a mouse. It enables managers to increase
than ever, and fight competition from rience is a big part of what compelled us to efficiencies and reduce losses.
on-line alternatives that are only increasing. invest in the company. Solink has a vision to
Part of this evolution includes embracing revolutionize the value and use of security “We love hearing that our product helped
newer, more powerful, more flexible busi- cameras in businesses. We are a fan of that.” business owners get more time with their
ness tools that are easy to use and provide a kids, or helped a manager solve a policy
clear return on the investment. Solink CEO Mike Matta knows that secur- or security issue in just a few clicks,” Matta
ing this funding will allow the company to shared. “Business intelligence, when used
This describes the Solink customer value grow in exciting new ways. He stated, “This properly, is powerful. But when we integrate
proposition accurately. And this January, new round of funding will enable us to scale video as a layer of information, we disrupt
that successful value proposition attracted a the company and continue cementing our the traditional concept of BI. We add truth
significant new investment in the company. position as a leader for B2B video and data and context that can’t be repudiated.”
Chicago-based Valor Equity Partners led a intelligence. We have a focus on helping
new financing round that resulted in $16.3M customers grow their businesses, and it is This is a combination that sounds like a
of Series A funding to enable Solink to working out well.” great investment to us … solink.com
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 7 ❯
Global Growth
Continues for
Turkish Company
Segmentify
A member company of the Alacrity Turkey
start-up fund, Segmentify has developed
technology to deliver personalized, rele-
vant suggestions and recommendations to
ecommerce customers through multiple
marketing channels including personalized
push notifications and emails. The purpose is
to enable client businesses to increase online
sales, customer loyalty and repeat purchases.
The company continues to evolve its
machine-learning-based SaaS platform and
increase its market penetration. By the end
of last Quarter, Segmentify increased its cus-
tomer base by 10% and covered 16 countries
including large markets in Germany and the
UK. This customer growth yielded an increase
of 25% in Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR
— a key SaaS industry metric).
Proving the ability to meet the scale and
ROI demands of global brands, Segmentify
“onsite personalization widgets” were used
to improve 13.32 billion online shopping
experiences and helped generate £412 mil-
lion in targeted sales for clients in 2018.
The Segmentify platform lets clients choose provided the highest ROI compared to other
Ergin Eroğlu, CEO of Segmentify, com- from 10 preset customer outreach scenarios tactics, and in some examples, added a 4%
mented on these results, saying, “With our (e.g., Abandoned Cart Reminders,. Order uplift to client online revenues. Of course,
new products, we provide clients with an Follow-Up notes, etc.) and then tailor each like all digital tactics, they must be deployed
omni-channel personalization platform that message from there. As noted above, Push strategically to yield such results. And to help
allows them to build individual but unified Notifications — messages that pop up on achieve this, the Segmentify platform offers
relationships with their customers on mul- mobile devices automatically — are another both personalized and segmented Push
tiple marketing channels. Email campaigns key feature of the platform. These messages Notification features, including 10 different
are still a strong tactic, and they are a great are simple to create, can be sent at any time, self-triggering ‘scenarios’ for use (custom-
way to keep in touch with customers and and customers don’t have to be in a specific izable campaign variables such as defined
remind them about their favourite products. application or even using their devices to send-times, frequency caps, campaign life-
However, now that everyone is doing that, receive them. cycles and more).
leading brands are looking for ways to dif-
ferentiate their marketing programs. And our These characteristics caused Push More information about this growing
ecommerce personalization capabilities are Notifications to rank in the Top 5 for mar- company and its platform can be found
among the best new tools.” keting channel effectiveness in 2018. They on the website. segmentify.com
❮ 8 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019
PRONTOFORMS KEEPS
SECURING NEW
ENTERPRISE CUSTOMERS
ProntoForms Corporation, the leader
in smart mobile forms, signed a multi-
year agreement this Quarter to deploy its
Enterprise-tier solution with another Global
Fortune 500 company. The contract has a
total value of approximately $900,000 USD,
and is evidence of the inroads the company
is making into the enterprise SaaS sector.
The software platform will be used by this
customer to improve the quality of medical
device inspection and maintenance services
in hospitals and clinics around the world. The A simple and agile platform that allows
Alvaro Pombo, CEO and founder of
software will help improve the “in service” ongoing development of apps and ProntoForms commented that, “Enterprise
levels of the medical devices, improve the extended use cases to meet business companies look for fast time-to-market solu-
consistency and reliability of the field tech- growth and evolution. tions. They want to build business focused,
nicians’ work, and by extension will increase A platform that supports unique work
easy-to-use apps that will accelerate their
the overall quality of the healthcare provided. and compliance requirements in more field automation initiatives. Our platform
than 100 countries. continues to demonstrate strengths in these
Features of the software that enabled the Contextual workflows to enable techni-
areas and that is key to our continued growth
company to win this contract included: cians to work through complex tasks. strategy.” prontoforms.com
An agile no-/low-code platform with Workflows to share field data with man-
®
automated governance to help ensure agement, partners and suppliers outside
compliance with IT policies. their core systems.
ICC WALES EMBRACING order to drive commercial engagement. But with successful events. The answers formed
are the Centres themselves doing all they a playbook with which to operate the new
NEW TECHNOLOGIES can to maximize the value delivered in these facility, and drove a commitment by the
TO MAXIMIZE guest experiences and engagements? team to become recognized as ‘best-in-class’
in functions and services that included:
GUEST EXPERIENCE The state-of-the-art International Conven-
AND OPERATIONAL tion Centre Wales (ICCW) is working hard to Pre-event booking services
ensure it does deliver that value. The venue Parking optimization
EFFECTIVENESS is being built/finished with conference Transportation logistics management
technology at its core, embedding new Delegate count monitoring
event-related features and applications into Queue length monitoring
the infrastructure from the start. Wait time management
Convention Centres are in the business Lecture/presentation timing
of marrying appealing events and guest During the facility design phase, ICCW management
speakers with volumes of attendees and management consulted with conference VIP concierge services
commanding not-trivial prices for the organizers around the world to identify Security services
opportunity to take in the show or present a and understand the most important Key Overall guest ‘journey’ tracking, and more
company brand to the assembled crowds in Performance Indicators (KPIs) associated
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 9 ❯
Consider for example the movement in and the use of software from InitLive. The SaaS
out of the facility of guests, exhibitors, staff platform and mobile device app lets event
and others. Visitors to large venues are often managers plan, prepare and execute their
left asking “Why are the lines so long?” or business, community and other events more
“Didn’t they plan for crowds of this size?”, easily and successfully. Features inherent in
or similar but less-polite questions. Such the tool help organisers register the volun-
situations are not always easy to tolerate at teers they need for an event, schedule and
important or costly events. manage the shifts for these resources, alert
individuals or groups digitally (over their
Technologies such as that available from smartphone) to any changes, issues or emer-
Solink help address these issues. A network gencies, and report after the event on overall
of artificial intelligence and 3D cameras are performance for future planning.
being installed at the ICCW to constantly
monitor the flow of delegates through the Increasingly, delegates today look for event
facility. It begins at the taxi drop-off and information pertaining to registration, to any issues, and feeds into active public
pick-up area, where the spaces and vehicle content agendas and other proceedings relations and news generation strategies.
flow will be managed carefully, and it includes through their smartphones. Conferences Technology from Eyesover and Echosec
the registration areas where lines and crowds now create bespoke mobile applications leverage publicly accessible social media
will be monitored to reduce wait times. The to manage this customer engagement and and online data feeds to monitor and under-
system recognizes and even ‘anticipates’ high exchange of information. Evidence shows stand guest trends and opinions in real-time.
traffic situations based on aggregated data, that the importance of these apps contin- Armed with this data, artificial intelligence
and keeps human operators informed and ues to grow. However, one shortcoming is analyses a venue to compile reports of posi-
prepared to react. Higher rates of people the limited ability to connect guests to live tive and negative impacts, event influencers
movement trigger predefined responses (human) support services to address individ- and common opinions. Understanding
such as real-time messaging on facility sign- ual questions, concerns or requirements. This how the event logistics, content, schedules
age, as well as alerts to staff mobile devices is particularly important with higher-end and other characteristics are being received
to adjust resource allocation. offerings such as VIP Concierge Services. by guests allows organisers to react in the
moment as well as adjust future plans.
The Solink technology is being augmented Talkative provides software that the ICCW For example, being able to address any
with that from portfolio company Teldio. will promote from the start as an essential less-than-desirable situations before any
Heat map features from Teldio provide vis- add-on utility for all conference apps. The guest opinions go viral adds a level of mes-
ual representations of people movement real-time web-chat functionality is embed- sage management and control not other-
at given locations, identifying pinch-points ded into the app in seconds and enables live wise available.
for example, and enabling more effective communication between conference dele-
pre-event planning as well as real-time gates and a team of specialists so that que- The ICCW is investing in technologies such
adjustments of layouts, displays and other ries are responded to and resolved as quickly as these and others to help ensure the KPIs
infrastructure. Specific assets or whole areas as possible. App users are offered a choice as identified earlier remain at a best-in-class
of the facility can be identified digitally to how they wish to communicate. In a noisy level. These are investments in making the
as ‘secure’ or restricted, and Teldio track- venue, text-chat may be a quick and appro- event ‘journey’ a positive one for guests, and
ing beacon technology will alert staff to priate method, but other times video chat, the events themselves as successful as pos-
unauthorised approaches to these areas. The perhaps to translate signage or help with sible for the organisers and staff who bring
Teldio software integrates into existing infra- ongoing travel, may be more useful. And it is them to the facility. The doors will be open-
structure and provides efficient communica- all centralised within the original conference ing soon. We look forward to reporting on
tion between organisers and staff who are app to keep things simple. the results. iccwales.com
connected using wireless radios as well as
those using SMS or other instant messaging. Monitoring and analysing real-time guest This article was from a blog by Paul Bailey,
sentiment during a conference itself gener- Marketing and Design Director, Wesley
Staff and volunteer management at the ates unique and very valuable feedback for Clover Innovation Centre, UK.
Centre are also being enhanced through event organisers. It enables rapid response
❮ 10 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019The Latest Venture Capital pull-back in Q4 of 2018, but at nearly $52B in investments, it was
still the third-strongest quarterly result. In keeping with the trend
Activities and Trends identified above, the total number of deals during that quarter also
declined, by more than 700 from the peak two quarters earlier.
As this is the first issue of Q for calendar 2019, we thought it
would make sense to provide an update on the latest invest-
ment activities being reported around the world. Combining a
number of sources, we offer the following picture.
The Global View
PWC and CB Insights released their MoneyTree Report earlier
this year, and according to their research, VC-backed companies
raised more than $207B USD in 2018, a 21% increase from the total
of $171B raised in 2017. The total number of deals completed was
14,247 — an increase of 10% from 2017.
Much of the near-record total was driven by an increase in
deals valued at more than $100M, with 382 such deals closing versus More of the US Story
266 in 2017. Not surprisingly, nearly half these mega-deals took place Digging deeper into the 2018 results in the US, the trend to
in the US. fewer, bigger deals was reflected in a decline in seed-stage activity
for the fourth year in a row. And over the last five years, the ratio of
early- to later-stage investing has shifted from roughly a 60-40 split
to 50-50. Using 2018 results, that represents almost $10B of enabling
capital that moved from start-ups to more established companies.
In terms of where in the US the deal-making was being done,
again it is not surprising to find the state of California leading the
way. New York (state) and Massachusetts traded spots in second and
third place depending on whether the measurement was number of
deals done or amount of funds invested. But these activities were also
taking place in many more locales as well, confirming that clusters of
innovation are growing around the country.
There, a total of 184 $100M+ deals closed last year, which was
more than a 50% increase from 2017. Overall, US start-ups secured
nearly $99.5B in funding, a 30% year-over-year increase and the
highest total since the dot-com craze set the current record of $119B
in 2000. However, the 5,536 total deals was the lowest number
since 2013. The result is that more money was placed into fewer US
companies but apparently at higher valuations, reflecting an investor
appetite there for fewer but larger deals.
In Asia, the story was somewhat opposite. Total funding
increased by a modest 11% for the year, to just under $81B. However,
the total number of deals surged 42% to more than 5050. And in
Europe, the results were a little less dramatic. Deal activity there That said, the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area once again far
slipped, but only slightly, from 2,871 in 2017 to 2,745 last year. outstripped any other in the country in investment activity for the
However the total funding climbed 17% from $18B to $21B. year. In terms of deals done, the 380 deals may have been only 31% of
Looking at global trends over the last two years, overall fund- the 1211 total for the country. But in terms of funds invested, the total
ing has climbed quarter-over quarter. One exception was a small in the fourth quarter of 2018 alone was almost equal to the rest of the
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 11 ❯country combined, at about $12B out of $25.0B for
the US as a whole. A key take-away — if you want
to raise more money on a deal, it still pays to chase
it in Silicon Valley.
Where the Investments are Going
In terms of the industry sectors that attracted
the most funding in 2018, again the US is a good
indicator of global trends. There, the dominant sec-
tor was the ‘Internet’, with a total 540 deals (more
than three times the closest sector) and more than
$9.0B dollars invested in the fourth quarter alone
(more than twice the next sector).
Hopefully for the benefit of us all, Healthcare
companies were the next-most attractive for invest-
ment, securing $4.0B dollars across 162 deals. Mobile
and telecom app companies were not far behind
at $3.5B over 150 deals, followed by non-Internet/
non-Mobile software companies ($3.0B on 111 deals). It was a big those investors interested in funding less deals with larger amounts
drop off from there, where Consumer Product and Services compa- of money, to be focused on business expansion activity.
nies were able to close only 51 deals. The state of California was particularly active in the funding of
In terms of specific technologies, annual funding for Artificial AI. 53 deals and just under $2.0B in investment took place there in just
Intelligence (AI) initiatives, which cross over industry sectors, has the fourth quarter of the year. Massachusetts was a distant second
risen steadily over the years. And while the number of investments during that period, with only 13 deals and roughly $250.0M invested,
in 2018 dropped noticeably (down to 466 from 533), the amount of and the drop off continued to Texas which rounded out the Top Five
funds committed jumped the most, at 72% to $9.3B. This suggests states with just 3 deals and $10.0M in financing. It is clear a growing
companies in the space are maturing their products and attracting ecosystem for AI companies continues to form in California.
continued on page 22
ALACRITÉ FRANCE addressed currently. The customer needs
behind each of the solutions were brought
their stores more rapidly. Automating these
procedures and generating the insight the
LAUNCHES FIRST forward by Wesley Clover International solution provides helps clients improve their
TWO START-UPS and Mitel Networks (both key stakeholders
in Alacrité France), as part of the Alacrity
bottom line. The insight comes from con-
necting existing customer video-surveillance
company building model. systems together with ‘point of sale’ (POS)
Alacrité (France) is located in LILLE, a com- terminals and other network-connected
mercial and industrial city 200 kilometers business systems to provide video/data
North of Paris. During the Quarter, the fund records of specific business events.
housed four project teams (teams working
on their first business/product ideas) as well The ReactEvent platform is based on intel-
as two newly-incorporated start-ups. lectual property sourced from Solink, an
affiliate of the Wesley Clover ecosystem.
Called ReactEvent and Diskyver, the two Solink provided the IP to kick start the pro-
new companies have been incubated in the ject and enable a complimentary solution
Alacrité program over the past year. Both are to what they already offer. A Memorandum
now staffed and financed for the next critical ReactEvent has created a new video-based of Understanding (MoU) is in place between
steps in their journeys toward business business intelligence platform for brick-and- both parties, and the two are working on
success, and each is bringing an original mortar businesses that helps owners and even greater technical and business colla
solution to a market opportunity that is not managers identify and react to events in boration moving forward.
❮ 12 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019manufacturers were being attacked by crim- In the case of each of these new companies,
inal elements in scams that according to the they have taken steps to ensure their solu-
Communications Fraud Control Association tions will be relevant across as broad a range
(CFCA) were resulting in worldwide financial of customers as possible. But like all good
losses amounting to $29.2 Billion! start-ups, they are resisting any temptation
to try and be ‘all things to all people’. They
Diskyver, on the other hand, is developing It was evident that telecommunications are keeping distractions to a minimum, and
cybersecurity solutions for enterprise tele- cybersecurity solutions on the same level taking small, calculated steps to build their
phone systems. This is a traditional market as those available to the IT sector were new businesses. Again, exactly as the Alacrity
space, but is one where customers intro- required, and that the need was not being model and program encourages.
duce risk when evolving their systems to addressed by existing cybersecurity firms. In
newer IP and cloud technologies. The mar- response, Diskyver has now applied artificial We look forward to reporting about
ket need was identified and further defined intelligence (AI) and machine learning to the more of their growth in future issues of Q.
by Mitel France shortly after the Alacrité design of a software platform that provides alacrite.fr
fund was formed a year ago. They were this protection in real-time. The new platform
observing first-hand how new IPBX (digi- will be available shortly.
tal office telephone) installations from all
ENGLISH NINJAS or Android Google Play Store. They then
register with the system and subscribe to
PROVIDES A SOLUTION the monthly service package they want
TO A GLOBAL DEMAND (selecting topics, frequency, etc.). Payment
is done by credit card and charged every
month until the customer cancels.
English Ninjas, one of the Turkey-based
Alacrity companies, has created an online A disruptive new approach to a traditional
portal and mobile application for acquiring service industry. And the results are impres-
one-on-one English-language teaching ser- sive. Students received more than 8250 hours
vices. Customers speak with and learn from of live training last Quarter, an increase of
trained tutors at any time, from anywhere. It 43% from the previous period. Revenues
is an innovative approach to the English-as- for the company increased by 20% over the
a-second-language education market, using same timeframe. Most of that revenue is
a model similar to that now deployed world- currently being generated from students in
wide in another industry by UBER. Turkey, Brazil, South Korea, Japan and Saudi
Arabia, but as these demographics and the
English Ninjas does not operate any schools system architecture prove, there are no limits
or other teaching facilities. It does not to where the services can be delivered and
employ dozens of teachers. Instead the based on their own interests, professions or consumed. The team is also about to launch
software they have built manages the inter- objectives. They select the tutor(s) they want a variant of the platform for teaching English
actions between students of all ages and to work with — one or many. They even to children.
proficiencies around the globe who wish choose the mutually agreeable schedule
to improve their English speaking skills, and they wish to follow — 7/24/365. Tutors and Look for further updates on this exciting
similarly dispersed English-speaking tutors. students are both evaluated automatically new company, and see for yourself online
The mobile- and web-based app offers after each session to ensure the learning at englishninjas.com.
video or voice-only engagement between objectives are met and the teaching quality
student and tutor, and the curriculums and is maintained at the highest levels.
testing sessions that are aligned to the indi-
vidual pace of each student. Students select Customers (students) download the English
the topics they wish to use for their learning, Ninjas application from the Apple App Store
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 13 ❯Cliniconex Growth
Continuing in 2019
Cliniconex is on a mission to improve patient
engagement across the healthcare industry.
In 2018 the company added more than 1,300
medical professionals and senior care provid-
ers to its user community, bringing the total to
more than 4,500. Cliniconex SaaS technology
now helps trigger more than 550,000 patient
engagements each month, reducing patient
no-shows, improving patient and resident sat-
isfaction, lowering clinic operating costs and
returning valuable time to care providers.
The end of 2018 was a very active period for the
development team as they completed work on
the first release of a new patient surveying and
health promotion module called HQI (Health
Quality Improvement). The software plugs into
clinic Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems Cliniconex expects to see greater growth from
and generates automated post-appointment this channel moving forward.
Pilot customers are
surveying to increase patient response rates very pleased with the
and yield greater demographic insight. Last November, the Cliniconex team results, experiencing
attended the PointClickCare SUMMIT2018 higher response
Pilot customers are very pleased with the in Nashville TN, marking the official entry for
results, experiencing higher response rates the company into the U.S. Long Term Care rates to surveys that
to surveys that enable them to better com- industry. PointClickCare is the largest EHR enable them to better
ply with regional requirements for increased vendor in North America, and thanks to the comply with regional
reporting on patient experiences. For example, SaaS integration that now qualifies Cliniconex
“Cliniconex has helped the Manitoulin Central as a PointClickCare Marketplace vendor, this
requirements for
Family Health Team improve response rates event brought together more than 2,000 increased reporting on
for surveys by an estimated 85%,” said Lori potential new customers. New features for patient experiences.
Oswald, Executive Director. “We are better resident family engagement, such as outbreak
equipped to measure patient satisfaction on notification and care plan reminders, were well
an on-going basis and able to build compre- received, validating the need for such services.
hensive quality improvement plans.”
The team returned from Nashville with close
In Canada, Cliniconex distributes its SaaS to 200 leads and has since been deploying
through the largest EMR vendors — QHR its software in several of these long term care
Technologies (Loblaw) and TELUS Health. In homes. This market segment is expected to
2018, these partners delivered more than yield much of the growth expected by the
$1.6M in SaaS services to clinic operators who company for 2019, with more than 1,600,000
continue to be loyal customers, exhibiting beds set as the deployment target.
a monthly ‘churn’ or abandon rate of less
than 0.5%. And with more sales enablement We will keep watch as these new sources of
sessions, customer symposiums and joint- growth come together for Cliniconex
marketing campaigns rolling out in 2019, in 2019. cliniconex.com
❮ 14 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019INITLIVE MOVING volunteer management was a top-5 reason
to buy event management technology. The
UP-MARKET TO TARGET data reaffirmed that event staff will make or
LARGER CUSTOMERS break the success of a given event, and there-
fore management of these key resources is
2018 was a pivotal year for InitLive, makers paramount to that success. It also showed
of a SaaS platform and mobile device app for that medium- to large-sized event produ-
managing business, community and other cers represent more than 40% of the overall
events as well as the staff and volunteers market, and a majority expect to spend more
required to organize and deliver those events to acquire the tools and technologies they
successfully. The year marked the start for the need to operate most effectively.
company of a “Bridge to Enterprise” strategy
that would transition the product, marketing InitLive is moving aggressively to address
and business development focus for the firm these needs and increase their own average
on to larger new customers. Customers that value per customer accordingly. This change Revenue per Account for 2018 coming in at
include single Event Producers who require is not without challenge, of course. For nearly double what it was the previous year.
more than 500 volunteers per internal or example, larger customers have more com-
third-party event, and Multi-Event producers plex workforce management needs, more The company continues to innovate faster
who organize five or more events annually extensive database and reporting needs, than ever, and they must, as not surprisingly
and manage more than 2000 volunteers in and greater feature capacity requirements. they are encountering new competitors
total across those events. InitLive is complet- They also expect an ‘enterprise’ approach to in this up-market segment. But the team
ing this transition as the first Quarter of 2019 pricing and support. InitLive has now imple- remains confident in their abilities to com-
comes to a close. mented software and operational changes pete and win, knowing their mobile-first,
to meet these needs, including a new licens- event-day features are distinct differentia-
Supporting the strategy, in a study done ing model with more scalable monthly fees tors. An increasing number of new custom-
recently by Capterra, a popular Web service based on event quantity and sizes. Returns ers are proving this to be true. We will watch
that helps businesses find software solutions, on these investments are validating the as this community continues to grow.
43% of respondents suggested that staff/ strategic change already, with the Average initlive.com
THINKRF RELEASES as GPS) functionality. This new platform
enables users to conduct advanced spec-
Dr. Jasvinder Obhi, VP Product Management
and Marketing at ThinkRF. “This is a significant
SPECTRUM ANALYZER trum analysis in the burgeoning new market step forward for customers focused on
WITH GPS INTEGRATION that includes moving vehicle (autonomous
or not) and other mobile applications.
mobile situational awareness and other
advanced analysis applications.”
Ottawa-based ThinkRF is the leader in soft-
ware-defined spectrum analysis for detect- The built-in GPS capabilities add ongoing ThinkRF also released the ThinkRF P120
ing, analyzing and monitoring complex time and location data to the range of mea- Vehicular Power Conditioner, to provide reg-
radio signals in the rapidly evolving wireless surements taken and give users a full view of ulated power to portable spectrum analysis
landscape. Built on patented technologies, the dynamic spectrum environment, offer- gear and protect against vehicular power
ThinkRF has a large ecosystem to provide RF ing advanced geolocation techniques such transients. These new products will help
(radio frequency) Application Developers, as Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA), Power keep the company in a leadership position
RF Engineers and Monitoring Program Difference of Arrival (PDOA) and Angle of as the market opportunities continue to
Managers with unmatched, cost-effective Arrival (AOA) to pinpoint the location of sig- evolve. thinkrf.com
insight for their wireless research, develop- nals of interest in a range of new scenarios.
ment and deployment activities.
“The ThinkRF R5700 is the only analyzer
This Quarter, the company launched the that combines the performance needed
ThinkRF R5700, a real-time spectrum ana- to cover the 27 GHz frequency range with
lyzer with integrated Global Navigation the portability and form-factor to be used
Satellite System (GNSS — also known easily in a vehicle or in the field,” explained
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 15 ❯Wesley Clover Parks
Jumping From One
Season to the Next
Wesley Clover Parks is once again ramping
up for a busy summer season of programs
and events for the local community and
visitors. Here are several highlights from
the latest Quarter, and some hints at what
is up next:
CAMP FARM a formal plan is now in place to make the
Key among the recent steps taken to The Community Supported Pollination resulting donation to the chosen charity for
improve the visitor experience at the Project is returning to The Parks in 2019, the event, the Ottawa Senators Foundation.
Wesley Clover Parks Campground was in continued partnership with Gees Bees
the introduction of an online reservation Honey Company. The Project allows people
system. The 2018 season was the busiest to buy a seasonal share in an active beehive,
to date, and the new system is sure to meet their bees at harvest time, and receive a
prove its weight in gold once the 2019 12-month supply of the resulting honey. Last
season begins in May. year shares in the hives sold out in record
time, and the same is anticipated again
For example, seven new powered sites for this season. While the beehives have been
trailer camping have now been added, covered with snow over the last Quarter,
expanding the total available to 170 sites. providing them with necessary insulation
Bookings for all these sites are already against the winter cold, things will no doubt
ahead of previous years. be buzzing again soon … LEARN
The Ottawa Forest and Nature School is
GATHER building upon their licensed Nature-Based
The popular Magic of Lights holiday display Early Learning Program for 2019. This pro-
wrapped up another successful run at The gram offers preschoolers the opportunity to
Parks in January. Ticket sales increased more spend two days per week in an immersive
than 10% from the previous season as a forest experience, playing and learning in
record number of visitors took in the specta- outdoor spaces based around their cabin in
cle, which is becoming a new family holiday the Wesley Clover Parks Campground, and
tradition. The final math has been done, and popularity is skyrocketing.
❮ 16 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019PLAY RIDE
Kanata Nordic skiers have been grateful The Ottawa Equestrian Tournaments New for 2019, the Ian Millar School of
for a lot of snowy weather over the last return to Wesley Clover Parks for the 5th Horsemanship will be introducing a
Quarter, making full use of the more year in 2019. More than 1,500 horses horseback riding day camp tailored to
than 18 kilometers of trails at The Parks. competed in 2018, more than 20,000 pre-school children as well as one for
The annual Pretzel Sprint Race and Snow visitors attended, and more than riders preparing to compete. These are
Day events were very popular again, $435,000 in prize money was awarded. in addition to the popular beginner day
encouraging visitors to try a variety of The bar has been raised further this year camps. More information can be found
winter activities including classic and with the addition of the CSI2 Ottawa at wesleycloverparks.com.
skate skiing, snowshoeing, and even a International I and the return of the CSI3
laser-rifle biathlon station. Ottawa International II in July.
The West Ottawa Soccer Club is preparing The Parks will offer a variety of Bronze-,
quickly to take advantage of the sports Silver-, Gold- and Platinum-level events
fields at The Parks once again, with in 2019, including regional “Trillium”
plans in place to host the first games hunter-jumper competitions, the Ottawa
during the 3rd annual Wesley Clover Cup Dressage Festival, and for the first time,
Tournament and Showcase on April 13th the Ontario Horse Trials Association
and 14th, 2019. Championships. Overall, nearly 4,000
horses are expected to visit the site.
WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019 17 ❯AirVM Keeps Multi-Cloud Costs in Line
AirVM has created a multi-cloud moneti- six different providers to fully address needs Big names in the industry, including Amazon
zation platform called HyAlto that enables that include data privacy and sovereignty, Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google
service providers and enterprises to deploy compliance and security. Cloud Platform and VMware, are reaping
cloud services in any of the leading environ- the benefits. But challenges remain, such
ments from AWS, Microsoft, VMWare and This can make for a lot of complexity. What as ensuring enterprises, and the managed
others. The days of enterprises relying on makes the cloud so appealing — the ability service providers (MSPs) that work as trusted
premises-based servers to host applications to access services and capacity on demand, advisors between customers and cloud
and data, managed by internal “IT guys,” are conveniently and easily — can also give providers, have the tools to monitor usage
fading fast. Today, most organizations are rise to cost and other concerns, for example and track costs accurately.
turning to cloud services (aka “Something”- when there is a need to shift workloads and
as-a-Service) to handle their evolving needs data between different clouds. Multi-cloud enterprises need the visibility to
for computing horsepower, application host- ensure their cloud usage is aligned and sized
ing and data management. That said, multi-cloud is here to stay. Market correctly for their business priorities, and that
research firm Gartner last summer forecast they don’t pay for services or capacity they
And we are no longer talking about just large global growth for the sector through don’t need or use. AirVM and the HyAlto
one cloud. The market has evolved rapidly, 2018: 35.9 per cent for Infrastructure- cloud monetization platform provide a sin-
and the term “multi-cloud” now comes into as-a-Service (IaaS) to US$40.8 billion, 22.2 per gle dashboard through which to solve this
play frequently. This means an organization cent for Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) to challenge — one that is automated, cloud
is using services from more than one cloud US$73.6 billion, and 26 per cent for Platform- agnostic and scalable. Visit the website for
provider to deploy the best combination as-a-Service (PaaS) to $15 billion. And full insight. airvm.com
of services at the best price. On average, double-digit gains are expected to continue
enterprises with an established cloud strat- through 2022.
egy now use a combination of services from
❮ 18 WESLEY CLOVER QUARTERLY UPDATE | April 2019You can also read
