Based in Hamilton, Ontario, Innovation Factory is one of 17 Regional Innovation Centres across Ontario, providing free advisory services, training, and mentorship to entrepreneurs at every stage - from idea to scale-up. With a particular strength in life sciences, roughly 35% of the 850+ companies Innovation Factory supports each year come from that sector, drawn in part by Hamilton's exceptional ecosystem of hospitals, universities, and research institutions.

In this episode, host Jim Wilson speaks with Shannon Graszat, Manager of Venture Growth at Innovation Factory, about how the organization helps founders turn ideas into products, access hospital and university networks, and tap into funding programs - all at no cost. Shannon discusses the Synapse Life Sciences Consortium, which brings together key institutional partners to support life sciences companies not just locally, but from across the province and country.

This conversation highlights why Hamilton has emerged as a hub for life sciences innovation in Canada, and how entrepreneurs anywhere in Ontario can access Innovation Factory's growing suite of resources - remotely or in person.

Based in Toronto, Ontario, Skinopathy is a medical technology company on a mission to provide accessible healthcare on demand. By integrating advanced AI with smartphone technology, Skinopathy allows patients to screen for skin cancer and other conditions from home, bridging the gap between early detection and specialized medical intervention.

In this episode, host Jim Wilson speaks with co-founder and CEO Keith Loo about the company’s "accidental" beginnings during the COVID-19 pandemic. What started as a conversation between friends about the alarming rise in late-stage skin cancer became a life-saving tool now used globally. Keith discusses the technical challenge of building AI that works on all skin tones, navigating Canadian healthcare bureaucracy, and the emotional weight of building a company that helps patients "cancel their funerals."

This conversation explores the intersection of high-tech innovation and human-centric care, highlighting how a tool meant to be given away for free evolved into a clinically validated platform that outperforms traditional diagnostic standards.

Join host Jim Wilson for a conversation with Zaid Atto, founder and CEO of Xpan in Vaughan, Ontario.

Xpan is a medical device company focused on minimally invasive surgery, developing a new approach to surgical trocars used in laparoscopic procedures - tools that haven’t changed much in decades, despite being used in millions of procedures every year.

Zaid shares how the idea started while he was studying biomedical engineering at the University of Toronto, after hearing firsthand from surgeons frustrated with the limitations of existing devices. He walks through the journey from a university capstone project to building a company, and why he chose to move beyond research and into entrepreneurship to bring real solutions to patients.

This episode offers a grounded look at what it takes to turn a real clinical problem into a viable medical device.