Nicolas Miller has been to a lot of schools.
And he figures attending classes in Canada, Austria, Switzerland and Algeria has helped him understand the needs of different people and organizations when it comes to studying abroad.
His background seems to be paying off, with the CEO of Edvisor leading his company to the top-place finish at Monday night’s (September 21) B.C. Innovation Council-New Ventures startup competition.
“The study-abroad industry is actually very low-tech with few players in this space,” Miller told Business in Vancouver shortly before being awarded the $100,000 grand prize.
Edvisor has been looking to exploit that low-tech industry by developing a software platform that allows education agencies to manage study-abroad programs throughout the globe.
According to Miller, Edvisor has experienced 25% month-to-month growth since launching its platform in the summer of 2014.
“It felt like technology had overlooked this industry,” he said.
The company, which was founded in February 2014 and went through the Techstars accelerator program in New York, is beginning to collaborate with Vancouver schools.
Miller said the short-term goal is to have partnerships established with 20-25 of them in the coming months.
Other winners from the BCIC-New Ventures startup competition include virtual character developer Ziva Dynamics and fundraising platform Change Heroes.
Ziva CEO James Jacobs, who was awarded an Oscar in 2013 for advancements made in making digital characters appear more realistic, said he’d like to get his company’s platform out to the film and gaming community as soon as possible.
“What we’re doing as far as what’s commercially available is completely new,” said Jacobs, whose company took home $55,000 from the competition for making digital skin textures appear even more lifelike.
In addition to entertainment applications, the CEO said the tools Ziva is developing will make VR more realistic for surgical training purposes.
Change Heroes walked away with $37,000 for its third-place finish, while a total of 10 companies earned $300,000 in prizes throughout the award ceremony.
