The legendary Gary Bizzo from The Bizzo Management Group and Vancouverentrepreneur.ca provides you with The BC Weekly Business Report.  On what’s going on in our Province. Every week we bring you all up to date with new ventures, investment opportunities, start ups, technology, business activities and who’s doing what when it comes highlighting local BC entrepreneurs. All this great weekly business news will inform or may even inspire you to get involved, contact, network or even expand or start your own business. Enjoy the show! Episode #12 Vancouver Entrepreneur:Download this episode (right click and save) Now that summer vacations are finished I’m hoping business is going to ramp up. Vancouver almost closed down in August.

1)Shack Shine Home Services – The people who founded and developed 1-800 GOT JUNK? have launched their new company Shack Shine! This international franchise is now in 3 locations in BC east Toronto and down to Minnesota and Seattle. Their mission at Shack Shine is to make the ordinary business of home detailing exceptional.

2)Vancouver Founder Fund is a seed-stage venture capital fund that invests in some of the most promising technology companies based in BC. Vancouver Founder Fund leads or co-leads seed rounds ($100k-$1m) in companies based in Western Canada. They recently funded ThinkCX, a social customer insights company involved in Advanced and Predictive Analytics, with a $1 million investment in a Series Seed round.

3)ThinkCX’s social intelligence solution is a sophisticated machine-learning platform that uses the insights gained from publicly-posted social media content to predict exactly which customers are going to leave a brand. ThinkCX then delivers a proactive warning to the brand’s retention team, enabling them to reach out in a pre-emptive fashion to save the customer. ThinkCX operates as a standalone solution for brands that are in the initial stages of deploying predictive analytics.

4) IoT (Internet of Things) is electronics connected with buildings, products etc that collects data and connects to the internet. The IoT Design Shop is an internal startup devoted entirely to pursuing the IoT. Their goal is to apply the same commitment to innovation and quality which has made their App business a massive success to hardware and physical device Engineering. The parent company, Finger Food Studios, is an industry leader in mobile Application Development with over 50 developers and hundreds of application submissions to the Apple App Store and Google Play.

5)Endurance Wind Power (“Endurance”) is a manufacturer of advanced wind turbines designed specifically for distributed wind power applications. Their line of modern, induction-based wind turbines brings efficient, reliable, safe and quiet renewable energy to homeowners, businesses and institutions across Europe and North America. These guys are part of the BC Tech Association.

6) Which leads me into… The BC Tech Association is a place where talented and passionate believers put forth their very best to serve the needs of tech companies — connecting people, creating opportunities, and fostering the spirit of ‘we’. I love this description of who they are from their website, “We’re tech nerds and community cheerleaders, big kids and seasoned entrepreneurs. We’re foodies, athletes, sailors, and world travelers, and we’re on a mission to make BC the best place to grow a tech company.”The association is resource-rich for any tech company and the membership starts at $500/year.There are dozens of clean technology companies in the Greater Vancouver area.

7)Hydrogen in Motion – Safe, non-toxic, portable energy. Hydrogen In Motion (H2M) is developing mobile hydrogen storage tanks and will deliver these tanks to owners of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles for them to use with their hydrogen fuel equipment or vehicles. They claim that Huge strides have been made in the conversion of hydrogen into electricity and back and the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle is on the cusp of becoming a mainstream reality. I think this energy stalled after then Gov. Swartzenegger announced the hydrogen highway from LA to Alaska.

8) Greenlight Innovation is a leading global supplier of testing and diagnostic equipment to the fuel cell and hydrogen industries. Greenlight designs and manufactures automated test equipment for fuel cells and fuel cell systems. Greenlight has a global customer base of automotive companies, fuel cell developers, system integrators, and research organizations.

Weekly Events:

1)BNI Grand Fortune City Networking Lunch
Thursday, 8 September 2016 from 11:30 AM to 1:15 PM (PDT)Vancouver, BCThursday at Mahony and Sons Stamps Landing for our weekly networking meeting for small businesses and entrepreneurs. Prepare a 60 second infomercial, arrive on time, and bring plenty of business cards!Mahoney & Sons Stamps Landing601 Stamps LandingVancouver, BC V5Z 3Z1Canada.

2) 5 Powerful tips to Funnier, Better, More Dynamic Presentations by Amanda O’Leary
Tuesday, September 13, 20166:00 PM to 9:15 PMG&F Financial Group’s Mount Pleasant Branch2949 Main Street, Vancouver An evening of fun, storytelling, and presentation tips that only Amanda O’Leary can deliver. Master funny person, stage presence galore, engager extraordinaire, theatre trained, international presenter and award winning magician and entertainer Amanda shares her secrets of success for you to win in all your presentations.

3) Small Business BC is putting on CAMP TECH – SEO: HOW TO DRIVE MORE TRAFFIC TO YOUR WEBSITE
Date/Time: Tuesday September 13, 2016 |1:00PM – 4:00PMLocation: HiVE – 128 West Hastings, #210, Vancouver, BC V6B 1G8How to Drive More Traffic to Your Website unveils the tools and insider tricks to optimize your website so potential clients can find you faster. Learn how to target keywords, what to include in your content, how to elevate your social media SEO, and how to create good website content so people can find you online. It’s important to reach a wide audience on the Internet, and the easiest and fastest way to do that is with good SEO tactics!