TandemLaunch Blog

In part one of our series on How TandemLaunch Evaluates Technologies, we discussed the process of evaluating an invention by first identifying the technological problem it solves and then researching how that problem manifests in different markets. What you would have in hand at this stage is an invention, a clearly articulated technological problem, and a set of industries that have that technological problem in common. At this point we can start constructing narratives which will serve as hypotheses for businesses which we can validate through conversations with potential customers.

One of the most challenging times for an emerging startup, especially a technology-focused one, is the pre-revenue stage. In this stage, all resources are going into building a proof of concept, a minimum viable product, and a marketable deliverable. Sometimes, what is important and what is immediate can’t be easily differentiated. In the case of an early startup where money can mean the difference between life and death of a company, generating revenue from selling supplementary products and services can be one of the most valuable decisions entrepreneurs can make. 

As a venture capital (VC) fund, we at TandemLaunch see ourselves primarily as investors in people and technology. Our foundry approach to company creation, however, requires a different approach to opportunity evaluation. Where a more traditional VC fund is given a configuration of technology, talent and business strategy to evaluate as a whole, we must find a way to evaluate potential configurations of these aspects before they exist. How we do this will be the subject of this series of articles.

This month, Algolux and Mila Enter Artificial Intelligence Research Partnership and Landr raised $26M in Series B Financing. Check out all our July highlights below!

In November we celebrated the incubation of AAVAA as well as HaiLa winning the Nokia Open Innovation Challenge. Want to hear more? Check out all our news below!

AAVAA is a Montréal-based start-up with the dream to give everyone the power to seamlessly control their auditory environment without fumbling with devices. AAVAA solutions capitalize on the novelty of Brain and Biosignal Synthesis, the robustness of Acoustics, and the strength of Artificial Intelligence. We are building a bionic ear that selectively hears what you desire to hear without any cumbersome assumptions.

Press Release

Nokia names industrial automation startup HaiLa winner of the 2019 Nokia Open Innovation Challenge

21 November 2019

Espoo, Finland — Nokia today announced that Canadian startup company HaiLa, which offers technologies that can drastically reduce energy consumption for Internet of Things devices, has won the 2019 Nokia Open Innovation Challenge. HaiLa was awarded €100,000 in financial resources and will be given access to researchers and product development teams at Nokia and Nokia Bell Labs to position it for business growth as the world moves towards industrial automation enabled by 5G networks.

This month, we closed the final funding for TandemLaunch Ventures III and opened our doors for Collision Day! Want to hear more? Check out all our October news below!

New fund will support the creation of 20 new Canadian technology start-ups

Montreal, Quebec — November 4, 2019 — TandemLaunch, a start-up foundry and seed fund focused on creating, incubating and accelerating early-stage technology start-ups, today announced the final close of the TandemLaunch Ventures III (“TLVIII”) fund for total proceeds of approximately $30 million. This fund is dedicated to the creation of over twenty disruptive Quebec-based technology companies that have the potential for global commercialization.