Metiquity Ventures co-founding partners Bryan Slauko and Jacques LaPointe have shared the importance of giving back to Canada’s startup ecosystem.
With more than two decades experience as an investment professional, advisor, entrepreneur and director, Bryan remarked that “seeing lots of different businesses from an investment and finance perspective” has influenced the way he approaches working with startups.
However, Bryan also claims that “it is genuinely fun to just give that back to other people and give them the opportunity to succeed”, making the efforts of Metiqiuty Ventures to support early-stage companies and founders in Alberta into a mutually beneficial relationship.
He explained: “Founders want what comes after the investment, probably more than they want the money – they want the help, they want the expertise, they want the insights, and that’s really what gets us excited.
“Working with founders gets us out of bed every day because we do have the potential to fill in a lot of those blind spots people have and help them realise a potential they maybe didn’t know they had,” he continued.
Bryan noted that in situations where founders have had a rough few days (or weeks), the opportunity to speak to experts at Metiquity Ventures can give them some much-needed context into how this fits into their company’s startup journey and reassure them that everything will most likely be okay.
On the topic, Bryan added: “If you just stay dedicated, focus and keep moving forward, it’s fun to see people grow along the way and take advantage of the opportunities that are in front of them to help have a little piece in their success.”
Likewise, boasting more than 25 years of experience, Jacques LaPointe remarked: “I like to succeed, I like to win and I like to help companies do the same.”
As the former President and co-founder of Calgary-based Attabotics, Jacqued led Attabotics through its very first equity and grant funding and the significant investment and growth that followed during his three-year tenure.
While Jacque understands that many entrepreneurs may be able to forge a path for their company in a “longer time than they wish”, he maintains that the efforts of Metiquity ventures “can help them do it faster, and that’s what’s key”.
Jacques continued: “There’s hundreds of ways to chart a path forward and thousands of ways to mess it up, so if we can help [founders] see a different path that is more effective, quicker, faster, more efficient, and gets more attention in the right way, we’ve done our job.”