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At Best Startup Canada we track over 100,000 Canadian startups and over 500,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top British Columbia based CEO’ operating in the Art space. If you think a CEO’ is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.ca.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Handol Kim
CEO of Variational AI
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About Variational AI: Generative AI for drug discovery
Ryan Peterson
CEO and Co-Founder of Finger Food Studios
Ryan Peterson is the CEO and Co-Founder of Finger Food Advanced Technology Group. He sets the course for the organization with his extraordinary vision, strategic planning, and unshakeable passion. Under Ryan’s leadership as CEO, Finger Food has seen tremendous growth, transforming from a small basement startup to a multi-million dollar company with 180+ employees. Finger Food builds custom technology solutions to solve some of the most complex and challenging problems faced by businesses today in industries including games, retail, oil & gas, education, healthcare, mining and more. The company creates a competitive advantage for its clients by helping them own their technology stack, rather than simply deploying on the same technology platforms as their competitors. In-house expertise in AI, AR/VR, Blockchain, Robotics, and IoT, enables Finger Food to create impactful and elegant cloud, web, mobile, machine and advanced-interface solutions built on top of emerging technologies. Finger Food sees an unprecedented market opportunity. Within 3 years, the cumulative R&D spend of the Global 1,000 will reach USD 1T. A conservative estimate would put the innovation spend of each of these companies at around USD 100MM annually.
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About Finger Food Studios: Finger Food delivers technology-driven business solutions that enable companies to move and innovate faster.
Geordie Rose
Founder & CEO of Sanctuary AI
Geordie Rose is a founder and CTO of D-Wave. He is known as a leading advocate for quantum computing and physics-based processor design, and has been invited to speak on these topics in venues ranging from the 2003 TED Conference to Supercomputing 2008. His innovative and ambitious approach to building quantum computing technology has received coverage in MIT Technology Review magazine, The Economist, New Scientist, Scientific American and Science magazines, and one of his business strategies was profiled in a Harvard Business School case study. He has received several awards and accolades for his work with D-Wave, including being short-listed for a 2005 World Technology Award. Dr. Rose holds a PhD in theoretical physics from the University of British Columbia, specializing in quantum effects in materials. While at McMaster University, he graduated first in his class with a BEng in Engineering Physics, specializing in semiconductor engineering.
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About Sanctuary AI: Sanctuary AI is an artificial general intelligence company.
Sean Hinton
Founder, CEO of SkyHive
As an experienced global business leader with an MBA from Queen’s University, Sean possesses substantial expertise in skills development and is considered a thought leader on the Future of Work. With the mission of combating poverty and unemployment through the use of exponential technology, Sean strives to set a positive example for other entrepreneurs that a successful business can be built in a way that truly helps people.
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About SkyHive: SkyHive is an artificial intelligence technology that drives rapid reskilling of workforces and communities across the world.
Andrew Ahachinsky
CEO of Eterly
Andrew is a passionate longevity advocate and life science evangelist with background in mobile and software development. Andrew has been involved in several AI based life science projects aiming at optimizing lifestyle factors and biomarkers.
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About Eterly: Revolutionary artificial intelligence app for life extension
Hussein Hallak
CEO of Next Decentrum Technologies Inc
Founder and CEO of Next Decentrum, a blockchain company focused on helping museums, galleries, and leading artists create, manage, and promote NFT art and digital collectibles. In 2006, I launched CreativeArab, the world’s first and largest marketplace for Middle Eastern art focused on connecting artists across the Arab world with a global audience (acquired). Then I launched The Content People in 2010, an award-winning content marketing agency with clients that included Virgin Mobile, Pfizer, and Starbucks. In 2016 I joined Launch as General Manager. Launch is one of North America’s top tech hubs and startup incubators. We helped over 6500+ founders and 500+ startups raise over $1 billion. In 2019 I joined 3 tier logic as VP of Products & Strategy, I worked with some of the world’s most valuable brands including Universal Studios, P&G, and Kimberly Clark. I write and speak about startups, blockchain, and NFTs, and advise several blockchain and tech startups including Ami Pro, Gigr, Mobile Art School, Fintrux, Majik Bus, Traction Health, Cloud Nine, and Peace Geeks. Recognized in 2019 as one of 30 Vancouver tech thought-leaders and influencers to follow. Featured in Forbes, BBC, BetaKit, Entrepreneur, DailyHive, Notable, and CBC. When not building products, I enjoy writing, reading, and engaging in meaningful conversations over good coffee. My favourite pastimes are playing chess with my kids, binging on good drama and science fiction, drawing, and learning new guitar licks, sometimes all at the same time 🙂
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About Next Decentrum Technologies Inc: Next Decentrum enables access, empowers users, and unleashes an ever-evolving future through collaboration.
Kris Hartvigsen
CEO and Co-Founder of Dooly
Kris Hartvigsen currently works as Chief Executive Officer and the Co-Founder of Dooly.
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About Dooly: Dooly is a sales enablement platform that collects information and insights essential to close business sales.
Shahram Tafazoli
Founder, President & CEO of Motion Metrics
Shahram Tafazoli is the Founding CEO of Motion Metrics Int’l, a private Canadian corporation dedicated to improving safety and efficiency of terrestrial mining using AI, rugged embedded vision, and cloud computing. Motion Metrics has deployed its innovative solutions in more than 60 large mining operations around the globe, digging copper, iron, gold, diamond, coal, and nickel. Shahram holds bachelor and master’s degrees from Sharif University of Technology in Iran and a PhD from the University of British Columbia (UBC), all in Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) with a focus on robotics and machine vision. He is an Adjunct Professor at the University of British Columbia’s ECE department and has offered various graduate-level courses. He has a passion for technology and has invested in a number of technology startups, including several ventures from Creative Destruction Lab. He is co-inventor of international patents with other engineers from Motion Metrics and recently received the UBC Applied Science Dean’s Medal of Distinction. Shahram has a passion for space technologies and is keen on applying them to terrestrial applications.
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About Motion Metrics: Motion Metrics is a Canadian mining technology company that uses artificial intelligence to improve mine safety and energy efficiency.
Craig Graham
Executive Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Rainmaker Entertainment
Craig Graham has served as Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Rainmaker Entertainment since November 2012. Solidifying and strengthening Rainmaker’s relationships with a view to securing a diverse mix of original intellectual property development and service productions that leverage Rainmaker’s core competencies into a sustainable, successful business is his mandate. Previously, as Chairman of the Special Committee for Entertainment One, Craig was instrumental in growing the company primarily through acquisitions. Craig has also served as Chief Operating Officer of Liquidation World Inc. since May 2011; is Chairman of KMDP Investments Inc. and serves as Director and investor of Twenty First Century Investments Inc., Diamond Estate Winery, Red Rock Insurance Services Ltd., and Norsim Ltd. Previously, he has served as Chairman and CEO of RONA Cashway Building Centers Ltd.; as President, CEO and Chairman of FRI Corporation; held C-level posts with SmithBooks, Illsley Bourbonnais Ward Howell International and Verity International Ltd; and served as a Member of the Advisory Board at The Shotgun Fund, L.P.
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About Rainmaker Entertainment: Rainmaker Entertainment is a CG animation studio creating unique CG animation styles using artist friendly tools.
Henry Universes
CEO of qT-group
15+ years of success in management, data analytics, and investment. Highly skilled at making innovative products live and grow: manage R&D teams and work with investors/partners. Being (certified) member of several famous global professional communities: CFA, CAIA, PRMIA, GARP, SOA, and CAS. Being a well-known scholar-researcher on wide range research areas: mathematics, computer science, finance, risk management, insurance, and economics. Having broad relations with data science researchers and analysts. Postdoctoral researcher at Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology on Machine Learning, PhD in Mathematics, MS in Computer Science, MA in Analysis, BA in Mathematics & Computer Science. CAIA, CFA, PRM and ERP certification. Senior analyst in quantitative and computational finance. Senior software design and developer (especially on parallel computing). Well-published researcher in the fields of control optimization, statistical machine learning, financial engineering.
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About qT-group: QT-Group, #1 Financial Capital Services. Let’s join for infinite & luxury profit
Jesse Chen
CEO CoPilot AI
Jesse is an ex-EA entrepreneur and the co-founder, CEO of CoPIlot AI. Jesse was involved in shipping 12 titles during his time at EA on the core FIFA team. Jesse has over 20 years of experience in the software industry and led the development and growth of CoPilot’s AI.
CoPilot AI is a SaaS company based in Vancouver, Canada in the AI Sales Enablement space. The company uses AI and dynamic video technology to help sales teams automatically target qualified prospects on social media, initiate one-to-one conversations, and surface timely sales opportunities without requiring any content marketing, spam emails, or advertising. The company’s vision and mission is to humanize the way businesses connect with their targeted audience at scale. Customers have connected with over 3.3M prospects in 2022 through CoPilot AI. With an AI engine trained on 8M conversation threads doubling every 8 months, CoPilot AI is becoming the leading sales, marketing and recruitment prospect platform.
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About CoPilot AI, WealthBar: CoPilot AI is a SaaS company that uses A.I. and rich social data to connect businesses with customers in a whole new way.
Eric Miao
Chairman and CEO of Elevoc
Eric is the Chairman and CEO of Elevoc, an AI company providing DNN-based speech enhancement and voice interaction solutions to multiple industries including smartphones, VoIPs, auto-motives, smart home and wearables, etc. Currently, Elevoc has successfully served some key industry players such as Lenovo, Mototrola, OnePlus, Xiaomi, TCL, etc. Eric holds a master degree from University of British Columbia and used to work for IBM and RBC. He started his entrepreneurship in 2014 in Vancouver and founded a start-up specializing in providing software and consulting service. In 2017, he came back to his motherland and founded Elevoc together with other two co-founders who are distinguished scientists and has devoted all their lifework to signal processing and DNN-based speech enhancement. In 2018, Elevoc got its A round of funding from Xiaomi and Qualcomm venture.
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About : Elevoc is a leading AI-powered audio solution provider on a mission to help people hear and be heard.
Yahoel Van Essen
Founder and CEO of Eleos Robotics
Yahoel Van Essen is the visionary and driving force behind the revolutionary RoboWeeder technology. As a high-tech entrepreneur, Yahoel leverages emerging technologies to solve low tech problems facing industry. He is passionate about creating new things. He was educated at BCIT in entrepreneurial marketing and business administration. Before Eleos Robotics he was solving problems in supply chain, digital marketing, and in marine technology. Yahoel comes from humble beginnings and is a believer in Jesus Christ.
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About Eleos Robotics: Eleos Robotics invented the RoboWeeder an artificially intelligent weeding killing robot.
Jake Tyler
CEO / Co-founder of Finn AI
Jake Tyler is Co-founder and CEO at Finn.ai, an award-winning AI powered personal banking and financial management assistant. Finn can regularly be found featured in the likes of USA Today, American Banker and Bloomberg, or on stage at Money20/20, Finovate and VivaTech Paris. Originally from Australia, he has worked and lived in five countries in the last decade. Prior to founding Finn, Jake was a Director at Brook Intelligence, as well as an M&A Strategy Consultant at PMSI Consulting (London). MBA at IE Business School.
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About Finn AI: Finn AI provides AI-powered conversational banking technology for personal banking and finance.
Sean Chan
CEO & Chairman of EquitySoft Investments
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About EquitySoft Investments: Canada’s only private wealth management entity specialized in machine-learning sentiment-scoring trading algorithms.
Tom Raycove
Founder CEO of Disrupted Logic
Founder at Disrupted Logic
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About Disrupted Logic: Big Data and Artificial Intelligence for Interactive Media Experiences
Richard Hui
Co-Founder & CEO of Warranty Life
President/CEO at Warranty Life
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About Warranty Life: Providing Usage-Based Mobile Device Insurance
Sami Asikainen
CEO and Co-founder of Carbon Trainer
Sami Asikainen is the CEO and Co-Founder of Carbon Trainer.
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About Carbon Trainer: fitness, hardware, consumer, saas, ai
Aaron Nielsen
Co-founder & CEO of ThinkCX
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About ThinkCX: Social Intelligence for Call Centers
Nolan Tait
Co-Founder & CEO of Internuncio Technologies Inc.
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About Internuncio Technologies Inc.: A Crowdsourcing Control Center, Built for Developers
Jonathan Yapp
CEO of M0THER.AI INTELLIGENCE INC.
Jonathan is a Vancouver-based serial entrepreneur, currently working on AI Consultancy M0THER.AI. Jonathan also founded web development agency Vibrant Software that was in business from 2006-2014, and free photo search engine Everystockphoto.com, which launched in 2006. Jonathan was a Producer on the 2016 AAA Video Game Gears of War 4.
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About M0THER.AI INTELLIGENCE INC.: AI Consulting Agency
Ryan Smith
Founder & CEO of FTSY
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About FTSY: FTSY (‘footsy’) is an A.I. platform that matches people to consumer goods where fit and comfort matter.
David Sussman
CEO of Plasmatic Technologies Inc.
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About Plasmatic Technologies Inc.: Empowering service providers and their customers to benefit from the Connected Home through whole-home insights and mobile experiences.
Slava Kurilyak
Founder and CEO of Produvia
Slava Kurilyak is the Founder and CEO of Produvia. Prior to that, Slava served as the CTO of Fitplan Technologies Inc.
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About Produvia: Produvia offers an on-demand platform for hiring artificial intelligence (AI) developers.
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