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Cam Rzadki

Cam Rzadki

Cam Rzadki

Cam has a diverse background in venture capital, finance, health tech, biotech, and AI/ML. Most recently, Cam was a Principal and Head of Ventures at Entrepreneur First, where he led a team of venture partners and coached first-time founders in customer hypothesis validation, market sizing, prototype development, and fundraising strategy. Prior to this, Cam was a Strategy & Investment Lead at Georgian, a venture capital firm, where he identified and invested in market leaders in core banking, applied AI, immersion tech, and cybersecurity. Cam has also held other leadership positions in the Canadian startup ecosystem including at Real Ventures, Front Row Ventures, and Creative Destruction Lab.

Ignition Café - April 2023

Date

Thursday April 20, 2023
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for all things entrepreneurship and innovation. The Café provides a stress-free networking environment for innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, and experts at Queen's and in Kingston to share their ideas, make valuable connections and be part of a vibrant community of like-minded individuals. 

For April's Ignition Café we will host a Health Innovation session followed by a networking session. Stay tuned for more details!

Ignition Café - March 2023

Date

Thursday March 16, 2023
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for all things entrepreneurship and innovation. The Café provides a stress-free networking environment for innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, and experts at Queen's and in Kingston to share their ideas, make valuable connections and be part of a vibrant community of like-minded individuals. 

This special Ignition Cafe will be a co-founder matching session! If you are looking for co-founders to join your venture, interested in joining a company yourself, or looking to learn on how to build a good team and network with likeminded innovators, this is for you!

Register here

Rémi Straus

Rémi Straus

Rémi Straus

Founder and Principal at 3 Peaks CPA

Rémi is an open-minded, collaborative, innovative CPA who assimilates information and integrates diverse ideas quickly to build resilience in organizations and maximize their impact. Rémi is available to provide strategic accounting and financial expertise for sustainable, long-term futures. Philosophy degree honed skills to identify questions, unpack ambiguities, and simplify explanations of complex information. Teaching world religion and philosophy deepened understanding and appreciation of people, cultures, and nuances that impact our society. Decade in public accounting trained technical expertise to guide owner-managed SMEs in their accounting needs (GAAP, financial statements, succession planning, income tax, GST/HST, forecasting, business valuations) in multiple industries. Leading significant financial restructuring at a national charity demonstrated astute business acumen to deliver solutions for budgeting, planning, reporting, training, and implementing Sage Intacct; and developed strong partnerships internally and externally. Since launching 3 Peaks CPA, developing credentials in sustainability reporting (UN SDPI), ESG (FSA Credential), and business valuations (CBV).

Ishmeet Sethi

Ishmeet Sethi

Ishmeet Sethi

Software Engineer at Microsoft

Ishmeet is a Software Engineer at Microsoft and leader with 6+ years of experience building Mobile and Web apps from scratch. He has scaled teams from 0 to 15+ while working on these products. In addition to working for Microsoft and Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), Ishmeet co-founded a startup, developed a suite of cross-platform process automation apps used by manufacturing enterprises across the globe, and generated $500,000+ in less than two years. Ishmeet's industry experience is backed by a master's degree in computer science from Queen's University. At Microsoft, Ishmeet works on the very popular Microsoft Teams iOS apps and is responsible for features around Performance and Fundamentals in Calling and Meetings area. During his time at Simplified Automation, Ishmeet built a distributed cloud and mobile solution for process automation in manufacturing. It includes the main web app, a supporting admin app, workspace management, and a native iOS app that's leveraged by global enterprises like Unilever and Whirlpool across North America, South America, EMEA, and APAC. He led a cross-functional team of 15+ software engineers following the Agile software development methodology.

Ignition Café - February 2023

Date

Thursday February 16, 2023
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

The DDQIC is pleased to announce that Ignition Café is back! Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for all things entrepreneurship and innovation. The Café provides a stress-free networking environment for innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, and experts at Queen's and in Kingston to share their ideas, make valuable connections and be part of a vibrant community of like-minded individuals. 

For this special Ignition Cafe we will be providing a networking opportunity for faculty researchers looking to commercialize their inventions. We invite you to join us if you are hoping to start a venture, looking for co-founders, or don’t know where to start. If you are a researcher who would you like to see your idea create impact in the community and opportunities for your students, this is a great way to network and meet likeminded innovators and the DDQIC team!

Register HERE

Ignition Café - January 2023

Date

Thursday January 19, 2023
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

The DDQIC is pleased to announce that Ignition Café is back! Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for all things entrepreneurship and innovation. The Café provides a stress-free networking environment for innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, and experts at Queen's and in Kingston to share their ideas, make valuable connections and be part of a vibrant community of like-minded individuals. 

For January's Ignition Cafe we will host a networking session!

Register here

QICSI 2023 Information Session

Date

Wednesday October 26, 2022
5:30 pm - 7:30 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

Applications for the Queen's Innovation Centre Summer Initiative (QICSI) program for 2023 are now open!

Have any questions? Meet the DDQIC team at the Info Session and learn more about QICSI 2023!

Register here

Ignition Café - November 2022

Date

Thursday November 24, 2022
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

The DDQIC is pleased to announce that Ignition Café is back! Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for all things entrepreneurship and innovation. The Café provides a stress-free networking environment for innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, and experts at Queen's and in Kingston to share their ideas, make valuable connections and be part of a vibrant community of like-minded individuals. 

November's Ignition Cafe will be the last one of the year! We will have a QICSI talk from Alumni followed by a networking session with appetizers and a cash bar.

Did you miss our QICSI info session in October? We are pleased to announce two QICSI alumni will attend our next Ignition Café to share about their ventures and experiences in the program! Anh Tran-Ly, Co-founder of C02L Tech, a research-based clean-tech venture and Erin Huitema, Co-founder of Alucia, an accessible lingerie brand. This will be the last chance to network and learn about the QICSI summer internship for aspiring entrepreneurs before applications are due on November 29.

All are welcome! Register to receive emails with more details closer to the event!

Register HERE

Ignition Café - October 2022

Date

Thursday October 20, 2022
5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Location

Event Commons (Room 103), Mitchell Hall Building - 69 Union Street West, Kingston, ON K7L 2N9

Connect with like-minded innovators, change-makers and experts from Queen's, Kingston and surrounding region at the Ignition Café! Hosted by the Dunin-Deshpande Queen’s Innovation Centre (DDQIC), Ignition Café is Kingston’s go-to monthly meet-up for anyone looking to meet like-minded change-makers, share ideas, collaborate and foster meaningful connections.

For October's Ignition Cafe we welcome Christian Breede from H+1 Solutions. This 90-minute session provides a series of key take aways through a combination of personal anecdotes and research that leaves the participants with a series of tools that they can implement immediately. A networking session with appetizers and cash bar will follow.

Register here

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