These Kootenay (women) entrepreneurs are taking all the risk…
THE LEAST YOU CAN DO IS WATCH.
Welcome to a very special edition of the Kootenay Pitch Competition where three women-identified entrepreneurs will take the virtual stage and pitch their business for Event #3 on April 8, 2021!
From the safety of your living room, cheer on Terry Van Horn from SMRT1 Technologies, Adele Hills from Sacral Solutions and Sarah Hobbs from Karma Well, as they pitch to a panel of judges featuring local and regional investors, industry professionals, and tech experts.
To make this an entirely women-led event, our host this time will be the organizer of the Kootenay Pitch Competition and Nelson Innovation Centre Manager, Karen Kornelsen. She’ll be coming to you from the NiC lounge. Tune in to get a taste for new Kootenay tech and support our local entrepreneurs.
Winner takes home $500 in cash, a KAST membership, free entrance into the New Ventures BC 2021 competition and KAST’s Venture Acceleration Program, a three-session Advisory Coaching package with Volition Advisors + ALL THE GLORY.
Big thanks to our sponsors: Nelson & District Credit Union, Traction on Demand, Volition Advisors & Selkirk Technology Access Centre and Kootenay Co-op!
Watch Event #3 of the Kootenay Pitch Competition
April 8, 2021
Meet the Entrepreneurs!
Terry Van Horn
SMRT1 Technologies, Nelson
Introducing Terry Van Horn, CEO of SMRT1 Technologies, a Nelson-based software as a service (SaaS) company that provides the technology to make vending machines smart.
Their technology is a bolt-on solution to existing industries, integrates with their customers’ existing software applications and provides access to real-time data analytics to better understand the consumer, their habits, and choices, creating a more powerful and profitable brand interaction and increasing revenue streams.
SMRT1 Founder Brad Pommen, Terry and the rest of their team have raised over $700,000 from friends and family. They’ve also worked hard to create strong and trusted relationships with their channel partners who bring extensive experience, credibility and opportunities.
Sarah Hobbs
Karma Well, Kimberley
Meet Sarah Hobbs, a 20-year veteran Registered Massage Therapist and founder of Karma Well, an app that brings clients and practitioners of various healing modalities together in one easy-to-use platform with the option to draw on corporate or community support.
This multi-sided web platform offers membership rates to users (patients) that want to make a commitment to their wellness. It offers users the ability to custom-build a wellness program with one or multiple practitioners or shop curated wellness programs built by practitioners or other users.
What makes KarmaWell special is its ability to specifically curate a program based on a patient’s needs while saving users, practitioners and employers time and money. Each party gets the tools to achieve their goals while cutting out erroneous costs and lost information about the user’s goals and progress. To date, practitioners have not had a tool to collaborate on a specific patient, and all too often often patients plateau or stop treatment due to lack of funds.
Adele Hills
Sacral Solutions, Creston
After a serious back injury years ago, Adele Hills struggled to recover despite surgeries and physiotherapy. Refusing to live in chronic pain and limitations, she immersed herself in the study of functional spinal alignment and back pain, which in turn inspired her to develop a product that not only provided relief when she was in the most pain, but also helped her rehabilitate, and importantly - adjusted to her changing needs.
After learning that back pain affects over 80 percent of North Americans by age 50, she recognized that a product she designed for her own rehabilitation could help so many others.
Sacral Solutions presents the Spinaline: an aftermarket seat topper. It’s the only product on the market that addresses the entire back pain issue, starting at the root. With six levels of customization, it can be continuously adjusted to your changing needs as your back health improves. It also offers customizable sacral, lumbar, thoracic, and pelvic support, where competitors mainly address only one issue with their products.The seat can also be used to prevent instability caused by habitual poor posture often imposed by poorly-designed seats.
Sacral Solutions has hit several milestones since its beginning in 2016; Adele and her team are excited about growing and scaling the business and getting their product to market.
Prizes
Besides bragging rights, the winner of EACH pitch event will take home:
- $500 in cold hard cash
- A free annual KAST membership
- Three months of free entry into the Venture Acceleration Program ($600 value), which includes 1:1 mentorship from an experienced mentor
- Free entrance into the New Ventures BC Competition in 2021 ($200 value), courtesy of New Venture BC. Note: All winners will be required to apply to the New Ventures BC Competition to be eligible for the Grand Finale prizing.
- Two hours of expert assistance, from a KAST Entrepreneur in Residence, for the application process for the New Ventures BC Competition.
- A three-session Advisory Coaching package with Volition Advisors (valued at $675).
The Grand Finale Winner takes home bragging rights, ALL the glory and…
- $1,000 in cold hard cash
- A free annual KAST membership
- Three months of free entry into the Venture Acceleration Program($600 value) which includes 1:1 mentorship from an experienced mentor
- Travel expenses paid for Pitch Day (up to $750) at the New Ventures BC Competition in 2021 if applicant accepted
Re-watch Event #1 of the Kootenay Pitch Competition
November 12
Re-watch Event #2 of the Kootenay Pitch Competition
February 4
About the Kootenay Pitch Competition 2020/21
For the first time in Kootenay history, technology entrepreneurs and startups from across the region will go head to head in the first ever virtual Kootenay Pitch Competition, hosted by KAST (Kootenay Association for Science & Technology) and Nelson Innovation Centre, and sponsored by Nelson & District Credit Union , Traction on Demand and Volition, Selkirk Technology Access Centre and Kootenay Co-op. Entrepreneurs will be competing for cold hard cash and amazing prizes. Mentorship, networking, support and incredible exposure are all up for grabs.
The competition is made up of three pitch events (November, February and April) with a Grand Finale pitch event taking place in Spring/Summer 2021.
