A new summit starting in Prince George next month is looking to boost northern BC’s innovation ecosystem by helping entrepreneurs learn how to pitch their products and then connect them with investors.
The series of events under the Northern Angel Summit 2025 kicks off this month, with an initial kick-off meeting and training sessions for company founders to learn how to pitch themselves and their products.
In June, a first round of 24 founders will be selected to give initial pitches in a quarter-finals event, which will be whittled down to a pool of 12 heading into a semi-final round.
A top six will be chosen after the semi-finals and will get due diligence training and evaluations over the summer.
The summit will culminate with a finale event on Sept. 25, where the finalists will vie for $100,000 in funds provided by angel investors in what Northern Innovation Network executive director Mary Mytting described as a “Dragon’s Den”-like event at the Prince George Conference & Civic Centre.
The network, formerly known as Hubspace, is one of 10 not-for-profit accelerators in BC, providing business coaching, mentorship, training, networking opportunities and connections with potential funding sources.
The event is being supported by the Northern Development Initiative Trust (NDIT), Innovate BC and Pacific Economic Development Canada.
Speaking with the Citizen on Friday, April 25, Mytting said that back in the summer of 2023, her organization started looking to other parts of northern BC beyond where they had been concentrating their efforts in the central interior.
After interviewing support organizations, businesses, chambers of commerce, they identified three major gaps: a lack of business supports, access to experts and access to private investment capital.
With the help of the NDIT, who provided two part-time staff, Mytting said the network was able to help provide more supports like individualized coaching.
However, the question of private investment still lingering. Mytting said she spoke with Owen Miller of Fort St. James-based Deadwood Innovations, who told her that it was difficult to raise capital in Vancouver because investors there don’t understand the industrial tech in the north.
After hearing similar feedback from other northern entrepreneurs, Mytting said she related to an event called the Okanagan Angel Summit and was inspired to develop a similar regional event for the north.
Mytting said after she grew up in Prince George before moving to Vancouver for 18 years and spending 12 years in South Africa before moving back to PG.
Coming back and seeing little population growth, she said she wondered why the city isn’t expanding and doesn’t have more businesses.
“And so I see this (summit) as a way of having businesses like technological ideas that come up at the university stay here and get financing here and get the attention here that they deserve,” she said.
“What happens then is we have a few successful companies and other companies say ‘you know what, they’ve got a solar panel manufacturer out there. They’re doing something in bioenergy, They’re doing something in biotech.’ … My passion in this is actually to grow that part.”
Prince George has a lot of smart, resilient people, Mytting said, but we don’t have an ecosystem to support their entrepreneurial ambitions and they instead look for that assistance down south.
However, she cited some local entrepreneurs who have found success like Deadwood Innovations, a Fort St. James-based company that uses a densification process that turns low-quality wood into higher-quality lumber, and Open Waters Solar, a Prince George-based which develops lightwater solar panels for use on marine vessels.
The summit is still looking for both investors and entrepreneurs looking to pitch as they head into the kick-off meeting for investors on May 26 and for founders on June 2 through 4.
Investors are asked to contribute $5,750 to be accredited for the program: a $5,000 contribution towards the investment pool, a $500 management fee and a $250 program fee.
The summit is looking for entrepreneurs in the early stages of their projects from Yukon, Northwest Territories and British Columbia who are able to attend all the events in person except for the quarter- and semi-finals with a prototype, a passionate team, identified early adopters and a plan to scale up.
Founders are charged a $150 application fee and those selected to enter the quarter-finals will need to pay a $200 program fee.
“We are … in search of businesses who have a strong idea,” Mytting said. “They’re looking to be something beyond a lifestyle business. They want to expand. They want to scale up. They want to look at other markets. They want to take over the Canadian market. They’ve got something new and wonderful. We’d like to have them based in the north, because that’s our region.”
A May 6 media release sent out by organizers announced that Willow RIver's Josh Nilson, the founder of Maskwa Investments, will be lending his expertise to the summit. Nilson previously was a co-founder of East Side Games, which created mobile games based on RuPaul's Drag Race and the Trailer Park Boys, and also serves a board member of the BC Tech Association as well as an entrepreneur in residents with Innovate BC.
Maskwa Investments supports Indigenous businesses in their early stages of their development.
"Northern BC doesn’t need to ask for a seat at the table—we’re building our own table. Supporting founders here means shaping the next wave of innovation," Nilson was quoted as saying in the release.
Organizers are looking for the summit to become an annual event to help drive economic growth in northern BC.
More information and application details can be found online at northernangelsummit.ca. The application deadline to participate in the summit is Friday, May 23.
