As much as Canada’s startup landscape has been seeing more financings (Clio being the latest deal announced), there’s still a long way to go before we have a healthy and robust capital ecosystem.
So it’s good to see the arrival of a new accelerator, Extreme Startups, which is launching with $7-million in funding from Extreme Venture Partners, OMERS Ventures, Rho Canada Ventures, BlackBerry Partners Fund and BDC.
Extreme Startups will have two cohorts of five companies/year. Each company in a 12-week cohort will receive $50,000 (in exchange for a 10% equity stake) and be eligible to receive up to $150,000 in a convertible note from BDC upon graduation.
“There is a great environment with a lot of talent and voracious entrepreneurs, so it’s a great space to be,” Andy Yang, chief innovation hunter with Extreme Startups, said in an interview.
Extreme University Rebranded
Extreme Startups is a rebranded and expanded version of the Extreme University accelerator program started by Extreme Venture Partners. In addition to having access to 29 mentors, the initial cohort will also have Dan Debow, who recently sold Rypple to Salesforce.com, as the “Entrepreneur Link”.
Yang described Extreme Startups’ investment approach as “agnostic”. The focus, he said, will be on entrepreneurs who are the “best and brightest…and have potential for leadership and great products”.
“I would say we’re looking for entrepreneurs and teams attacking large markets with disruptive technology and products,” Yang said.
Another key part of the program will be relationships and access to “leading technology companies and industry pillars”, which will be unveiled soon after negotiations are completed.
Applications open today and close March 1, 2012 for the spring 2012 cohort, which starts on March 15, 2012. Teams can apply at http://extremestartups.com
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