Most first-time founders begin with an idea and a lot of unanswered questions. How do I find customers? How do I find funding? What should I focus on first?
This is where Waterloo founders have an edge . They don't have to find the answers alone, because they are surrounded by a community of experienced founders willing to help.
This community was on full display at the latest Velocity Pitch Competition that kicked off Waterloo Tech Week. A hundred students had two minutes each to make their case to a room full of founders, investors and business leaders. Among them were more than 100 volunteer judges: alumni, business leaders and investors who gave their time to connect with the students and make introductions. Many have built companies of their own and chose to support the next generation.
It’s a culture that helps explain Waterloo’s global standing. In the most recent university rankings by PitchBook, Waterloo is first in Canada and seventh in the world for producing venture-backed founders.
For the students on the receiving end, the effect was immediate. Pranav Gavirneni (BASc '19, MASc in progress), founder of Lumatus Semiconductor, a company developing real-time tissue sensing to help surgeons tell cancerous tissue from healthy tissue, connected with more than 10 alumni and business leaders in a single day. He has already booked follow-up meetings with several of them.
Serena Wittenberg (BASc ’26, MASc in progress), founder of LARS, which designs semi-robotic tools that support ultrasound scanning without disrupting clinical workflow, was approached by angel investors, patent lawyers, and early-stage venture professionals after her pitch. Her follow-up conversations have already turned to early fundraising and long-term intellectual property strategy.
Sometimes one conversation is all it takes to open doors. Dr. Connor Kapahi (PhD ’26), founder and CEO of Mandel Diagnostics, won the pitch competition in 2023. Recently, at the Innovation Arena, the home of Velocity, Connor gave an unscripted, five-minute presentation to a visiting group that seemed unrelated to his business. One audience member introduced him to supplier contacts his team had been trying to reach for months.
Velocity has created a program called Alumni-X to give Velocity students and founders the chance to connect with University of Waterloo alumni who want to help them on their journey. Alumni can choose to:
You don't need to have started a company to make a difference. Whether your career has taken you through engineering, law, finance, marketing, research or something else entirely, early-stage founders benefit from people who know things they don't yet. The model works because Velocity helps founders de-risk their ideas quickly through first customers, pilot projects and early fundraising, while the broader Waterloo community supplies the mentorship and connections that help them scale. Since 2008, Velocity has helped launch more than 560 startups with a combined enterprise value of over $40 billion, creating thousands of jobs, and impacting lives around the world.
Every one of those companies had someone in its corner at a critical moment. The next generation of Waterloo founders is looking for theirs right now, and the people best placed to show up are the ones who remember what it was like to need them.
Help Velocity founders navigate their next steps, make connections, and unlock new opportunities.