Wireless lab launches new funding and mentoring program for wireless startups

The Network for Emerging Wireless Technologies (NEWT) has launched a new program aimed at commercializing within a year new wireless technologies, services or products for vertical markets such as transportation and workforce management. A contest dubbed Leapfrog will award three emerging wireless startups a contract worth $30,000 in cash and in-kind services including access to NEWT’s wireless test facility, development advice, business mentoring and venture capital contacts. NEWT marketing director Eric Larson says the goal of the program is to help emerging wireless companies with an innovative idea or technology find the right vertical market in which to sell their product. "The objective we had was to reach out to organizations that might have business concepts that include wireless, get them in here, get them into a dialogue and hopefully sponsor three of them in this case, and really back the heck out of them in terms of making sure they are successful with it," Larson tells Report on Wireless. The contest isn’t limited to Canadian companies either, Larson says. "We wanted to make it open enough so that companies that might not have opportunities like this in the U.S. might consider coming here and starting up operations in Canada as well." While the program appears to be targeted at vertical applications of wireless technology, it isn’t limited in scope. "We expect to see companies that are in the fringe areas of traditional wireless markets, (such as) utility industries, transportation, workforce, the IT components of any large organization that’s trying to deal with mobile workforce management. On the other hand, we’re really hoping to get a few oddball ideas that nobody thought about before that could represent relatively large markets as well," Larson says. For the initial run of the contest, NEWT will try to make it a twice-a-year event, Larson explains, adding that capacity constraints limit the number of companies that can be funded. "I’d also like to enable it to take in more than three companies at a time, but those are the limitations of our resources right now," he says. Larson admits that while the $30,000 may not be a lot of money for a wireless technology startup, NEWT can make the commercialization process much easier. "What it does is it eliminates the barrier of setting up the lab environment plus it gives them access to a much wider community in terms of being able to partner with people who might be willing to invest sweat equity," he says. "A guy that’s got some raw intellectual property that has never raised money before and really doesn’t know how to put together a business plan and talk to venture capital people, they can come in here and we’ll coach and mentor them through that process." Underused Nortel equipment led to formation NEWT was officially opened six months ago with funding from TRLabs, the three levels of government and some large corporate sponsors. Western Economic Diversification Canada funded the lab’s first two years of operation. Ongoing operations will be funded through membership fees. Any company with less than $30 million in annual revenue pays a $1,000 membership fee, which gives it access to lab personnel for consulting purposes. The lab’s prized possession is a test network formerly owned by Nortel Networks Corp. Larson says Nortel wasn’t getting full value out of the network, which was worth about $2 million, so it decided to donate the network to TRLabs. "Nortel went to TRLabs and said, ‘we want to be good corporate citizens. Is there something you guys can do with this network in order to predicate some economic development?’" Larson says. TRLabs, which is a telecommunications research outfit, then helped found NEWT, which is a commercialization centre, he adds.

Wireless lab launches new funding and mentoring program for wireless startups

News | March 18, 2003

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