a ringThe online jewelry platform Lyric Simone & Co. is one of seven teams in the 2020 cohort of the RBC EPIC Founders program.

New cohort of business founders hit the accelerator

The Entrepreneurship Practice and Innovation Centre (EPICentre) last week welcomed its summer 2020 cohort of seven teams to the RBC EPIC Founders program, an intensive 12-week startup accelerator.

Participants will explore their business ideas supported by a $6,000 stipend as seed funding, as well as mentorship, workshops, and other tools and resources. On Aug. 6, they will present their pitches to compete for cash prizes worth a total of $4,500.

The teams represent a variety of industries and academic disciplines:

  • Nia Thompson of Lyric Symone & Co., a subscription box service dedicated to providing a platform for small businesses.
  • Gagneet Kaur and Parneet Singh of Dignity, a platform for family members to track, monitor, and check in on the wellbeing of seniors in the care of agencies and other service providers.
  • Jaydee Tarpeh and Nyasha Kapfumvuti of Xenia Education Inc., an online learning platform to help institutions train international students on integrating to their new environments.
  • Michael Lucenkiw of the Environment Machine Shop, a social enterprise leveraging open-source strategies to develop the capacity for citizens to participate in environmental monitoring.
  • Richa Singh Madnawat and Dhrumil Patel of EdBot, a software application used by academic institutions to conduct online chat conversations.
  • Brauntë Petric, Adam Dunn, and Oliver Balmokune of Vectorgaze, a company that uses real-time rendering to provide animations and motion graphics with live and immediate feedback.
  • Sana Channar of Communicare, an emergency care app connecting volunteers to vulnerable people who need help delivering essential items to their homes.

Find more information on the EPICentre website.