Tech Roundup
Nov. 3, 2026
At just 21 years old, Kinza Mawji has landed a contract with Alberta's Ministry of Technology and Innovation for ScaleupMap, an AI-powered tool that aims to help founders, investors, and innovator programs unlock mutual success. "Any step in the direction of becoming an entrepreneur and building something (with my own team) from scratch, and then not only having paying customers, but landing a big deal like this, is a very nice feeling," Mawji told Taproot. "And it's an even better feeling to say we actually help people."
The tool has a growing number of features for three main user types. Founders can join a directory with all the information investors need to assess them and generally be more visible. There's also a "gamified" leaderboard with informal rankings of investability, and an "AI co-founder" chatbot to offer perspective. Investors, such as active user and patriarch Ashif Mawji of ScaleGood Fund, can see founder profiles and use AI-powered investor memos. Parties running a pitch competition or an accelerator, or those who need to evaluate a company for other reasons, can use the tool to see who matches their criteria. Alberta Innovates partnered with both the Mawjis to do just that for the Alberta Innovates Scaleup GAP Super Session Pitch Competition last year. (The winners were Zero Point Cryogenics, 2S Water, NiaHealth, and Calgary's ResVR.)
Both Kinza Mawji and the Ministry of Technology and Innovation told Taproot the bid was open and competitive. They were mum on the exact value of the deal as well as the precise uses and agreement length for ScaleupMap. Mawji said he'll be working with the ministry rather than just providing something off the shelf, and the contract is for more than $100,000. "The investment is expected to help more Alberta companies turn ideas into real business opportunities, access the funding they need, and build stronger companies that can grow," the ministry's press secretary, Claire West, told Taproot in an email. The timing couldn't be better: Mawji said he's wrapping up the last year of his undergrad at the University of Alberta, and ScaleupMap is his main focus for the foreseeable future. He intends to continue building the product while making outbound calls for the first time in the startup's history. "I think what's next for ScaleupMap is really getting the word out there," he said.
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Achievements and awards
- Six Edmonton companies will pitch for investment at Startup TNT's fall investment summit finale on Nov. 12: Aqtiva, which increases farmers' yields and reduces fertilizer use; MagnetaMR, which makes MRI scanning cheaper and more accessible; RECON Intelligence, which gives oil-and-gas drillers better data; Rosette Robotics, which speeds up accurate seed analysis; Sentir Technologies, which detects HVAC failures in commercial buildings; and Zylotex, which turns fibres such as hemp into replacements for cotton and synthetics.
- Edify's Top 40 Under 40 recognized Alyshah Nurani's work improving healthcare operations with technology at the Stollery Children's Hospital. The magazine also honoured Jessa Aco Kuchmak for technology and community leadership through Pontem Innovations and Edmonton's Filipino community. Also on the list from the University of Alberta were researchers Marlos Cholodovskis Machado for reinforcement learning and Arman Hemmati for engineering innovation.
- Sarcomere Dynamics won an award for innovation at the St. Albert and District Chamber of Commerce's Business Excellence Awards. The company is also a finalist at the ASTech Awards, which will be presented on Nov. 6 at The Westin.
- FoundersBeta's 2026 Startup Awards recognized Sam Jenkins and Jillian McLaren of Punchcard Systems, as well as Marissa McNeelands of Circa Thermal Studio as an exited founder at Toast.
- The Technology Transfer Services office at the University of Alberta recognized a long list of winners of its Innovation Awards. Among the spinoff companies formed in 2025-26 were ABClean Air Solutions, ABClean Energy, Aqtiva, DiaCell Therapeutics, Liquid Biotech Solutions, Enerbund, and SenseHuman.AI.
- DrugBank founder David Wishart received a Synergy Award from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada — his third NSERC award in three years. Wishart is a leading researcher in the field of metabolomics and is on a mission to improve drug discovery.
- The Alberta Ecotrust Foundation received a $1-million grant from the Peter Gilgan Foundation. The funding will support the Emissions-Neutral Building Information Exchange until November 2029.
- A University of Alberta team led by Lisa Willis secured $24 million from the federal New Frontiers in Research Fund. The project will study barriers facing young and racialized blood donors and develop technologies aimed at making blood products universally compatible.
Aerospace and defence
- Wyvern said Dragonette-005 is operational, bringing its hyperspectral-imaging constellation to five satellites. The company said the satellite, built and operated with Loft Orbital, increases imaging capacity and revisit frequency. "This milestone is a major step forward in Earth observation, particularly for critical industries, like defence and AI developers building the future of Earth intelligence," the company posted.
- Matrix GEMINI has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Florida Space Institute to develop technology for lunar construction. The collaboration will explore strengthening unrefined lunar surface material using low-power technology, with testing planned at Exolith Lab.
- Jones Microwave celebrated receiving $1.8 million in repayable funding from the federal government to expand manufacturing of its light-activated radio-frequency switching technology, with applications in communications, radar, and aerospace. The funding from Prairies Economic Development Canada was part of an Oct. 7 announcement that also saw Pegasus Imagery receive $2 million in repayable funding to further develop its ice-detection system for aircraft operators. Alberta Aviation, Aerospace & Defence received $1.2 million to strengthen Alberta's defence ecosystem.
- Zylotex co-founder Lelia Lawson described potential aerospace and defence applications of advanced materials from Canadian hemp straw on the Women in Leadership and Entrepreneurship podcast.
- Employees and partners at the Edmonton International Airport can now practise airfield scenarios using a new operations simulator. The airport said the program helps teams prepare to use specialized vehicles in challenging conditions.
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AI and machine learning
- The Alberta Beverage Container Recycling Corporation selected Corral Ai for container detection, counting, and verification. The startup will work at ABCRC's St. Albert and Calgary warehouses to help the corporation process more than two billion beverage containers annually.
- The Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute secured another $2.5 million for its Prairie AI adoption program from Prairies Economic Development Canada. The funding brings federal support to $5.6 million and will let the institute partner with 25 additional small and medium-sized businesses.
- Amber Simpson of the University of Alberta and the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute discussed AI-assisted mammograms on CBC's The Dose. She described the technology, which can help detect breast cancer and sometimes predict risk, as promising.
- Though the use of artificial intelligence has come under fire for its impact on the environment, the technology has a role to play in addressing environmental challenges, Mike Mellross of the Alberta Ecotrust Foundation told Taproot. "I do think that utilizing AI to achieve environmental outcomes is going to lead to optimized benefits," he said. "It's not the use of the AI to achieve those optimized benefits that is the demon that we need to demonize — it's the responsible development of AI that we need to optimize."
- Anthropic is in talks to lease the proposed Beacon Data Centers campus in Sturgeon County, The Globe and Mail reported, citing two unnamed sources. Both companies declined to comment. Meanwhile, Samson Cree Nation said it rejected a multimillion-dollar offer to withdraw its intervenor status on the project as opposition to data centres grows. Beacon said it would continue engaging with the First Nation. The Alberta Utilities Commission has approved the plant with conditions, despite Samson's opposition as the only remaining intervenor.
- Edmonton city council requested a report on ways to regulate and restrict large-scale data centres for next spring. Council also asked for updates on proposed and approved projects in Edmonton and the region.
- Alberta could lack about 5,200 construction and skilled trades workers for data centres, the Information and Communications Technology Council projected. That scenario assumes the province builds 80% of its planned data centre capacity over 10 years.
More headlines
- BioWare co-founder Greg Zeschuk reflected on the company's legacy following the decision by Electronic Arts to close the studio. "It's actually, in some ways, saddest for the city of Edmonton, where we're from, because we were kind of this beacon of hope and excitement and possibility," he told 80 Level in his first interview since the news. "We showed you could do something really special in a place that was not known for doing things like that." Zeschuk's fellow co-founder Trent Oster also looked back with CBC's This is Edmonton.
- Crimson Herring Studios has unveiled the trailer for Bay 12: Mech Repair, a first-person simulation about repairing and upgrading battle machines. It received 30,000 wishlists on game sales platforms in two days.
- MacEwan University researchers are studying whether interacting with a virtual dog can reduce stress. Former student Stefan Cvijovic told CBC's Edmonton AM how he developed the program, which lets users pet and play with a lifelike dog in virtual reality.
- University of Alberta researcher Ning Xiang spoke to New Harvest about her progress on growing food from cells. New Harvest selected Xiang to research cellular agriculture at the U of A in 2024; she was just named a Canada Research Chair in the field. She is working to build out a lab to develop pilot-scale cultured meat. She'll share more about her work at Bioeconomy Guild Night on Nov. 4 at MKT Fresh Food and Beer Market.
- Ordr appointed Daniel Montellano as an adviser to guide its expansion into lodging and hospitality. The company said he would help develop its customer-intelligence and integrated-payment products.
- Edmonton-born Tech Wednesdays has expanded to Vancouver, Victoria, Saskatoon, and San Francisco, with Calgary set to join on Nov. 4. Its free, informal pub gatherings complement speaker-led Tech Thursday events. Organizer Mykola Holovetskyi said attendees seeking startup or investor connections can find their way to Startup TNT.
- Edmonton Unlimited arranged 78 investor meetings for 32 selected companies during Edmonton Startup Week. The 14 participating investors included 11 from outside Edmonton, according to Alberta Innovates.
- CassaVantage partnered with the East Central Regional Innovation Network through last year's Get to Know Day, a recap from Alberta Innovates noted.
- Alberta introduced Bill 36, which would broaden the definitions of sexual exploitation and child harm to address online abuse. The proposed changes include online grooming and luring, as well as exposure to violence online or by electronic means.
Jobs and opportunities
- Pegasus Imagery is hiring an electronics engineering research specialist. The full-time, two-year role will develop aerospace-sensing hardware through a Mitacs Accelerate collaboration with the University of Alberta.
- Health Cities has extended its call for rural point-of-care diagnostic technologies to Nov. 5. It is seeking laboratory testing, portable imaging, and digital diagnostic solutions for pilots in a rural care setting.
- Health startups can apply before Nov. 10 to pitch at the Patients in Transition Summit on Nov. 18. The University of Alberta's Rehabilitation Robotics Laboratory will host the event at the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute and Edmonton Unlimited. Selected companies will have five minutes to pitch to clinicians, health-system leaders, researchers, and investors.
- Registration closes on Nov. 16 for the Climate + Health Hackathon, which will tackle wildfire-evacuation support on Nov. 28 at the University of Alberta.
- Lab2Market is accepting applications for its 16-week Launch Climate & Energy cohort. Delivered from Alberta, the national program will help students and research teams commercialize climate and energy research. An information session is scheduled for Nov. 30.
Happenings
Here are some events coming up soon:
- Nov. 3: Is Horizon Europe for Me? starting at 9am online
- Nov. 3: Diversity and Human Rights starting at 12pm online
- Nov. 3: 2026 Regional Supply Chain Forum starting at 3pm at Festival Place
- Nov. 4: NextGen Lunch & Learn: Entrepreneurship Culture: Building from the Ground (and Below) Up starting at 11:30am at Matrix Hotel
- Nov. 4: Tech Wednesdays starting at 5:30pm at The Pint Public House
- Nov. 4: Net Impact Trivia Night starting at 6pm at Double Dragon
- Nov. 4-7: DAMA Edmonton Conference: Powering Digital Health & AI Through Trusted Data at NAIT Productivity and Innovation Centre
- Nov. 5: Selling to the City starting at 9am online
- Nov. 5: Get Your First Customers starting at 12pm online
- Nov. 5: Don't Let Your Brand Get Eaten: Protecting Your IP in Food & Beverage Processing starting at 12pm online
- Nov. 5: Startup TNT Thursday Night Tradition starting at 4:L30pm at Fawkes Café & Bakery
- Nov. 6: 37th Annual ASTech Awards Gala and Innovation Showcase starting at 5pm at Westin Edmonton
And here are more to keep in mind:
- Nov. 12: Startup TNT: Top 5 Finale Night at Citadel Theatre
- Nov. 17 Earth 2.0: Engineering Small Steps to Save Our Planet starting at 2pm at University of Alberta (University Commons Building)
- Nov. 25: Tech For Good Alliance Working Group at Arcadia Brewing Co.
Visit the Taproot Edmonton Calendar for many more events in the Edmonton region.
This roundup was sponsored by Edmonton Unlimited.
Now is the time for us, Edmonton's innovators, and our city. Headquartered in Alberta's capital city, Edmonton Unlimited harnesses the power of possibility and brings the very best of Edmonton to the world.