B.C. companies earn rankings in Deloitte's Fast 50 Awards

Deloitte has announced the winners of their Technology Fast 50 program and eight companies hail from B.C., including Leadership Award winners Hootsuite and Global Relay. Companies are selected for innovation, entrepreneurship, leadership and revenue growth over a five-year period.

Hootsuite came in second place with a five year growth rate of 56,514 per cent. Vancouver-based QuickMobile came in fifth place with a growth rate of 12,332 per cent. Other B.C. winners included Clio, Avigilon Corporation, Zafin, Appnovation Technologies, Clevest and Photon Control Inc.

Five Leadership Awards were handed out, two of which were granted to B.C. companies Hootsuite and Global Relay, for growth, market attractiveness and effective management.

“The achievements of this year’s Fast 50 recipients are an indication that Canadian technology companies can excel here on home soil,” said Robert Nardi, Partner and National Technology Media & Telecommunications Leader for Deloitte in Canada. “Fast-growing companies used to look solely to the US to secure sources of capital when domestic venture capital dried up after 2000, but the pendulum is now swinging back into balance. That is the result of recently added investments to the Canadian technology investing sector. ”

Check out all 50 winners, including the Companies to Watch and Leadership Award winners on Deloitte’s website.

3 questions with Kari Lockhart, BC Leader of Deloitte’s Technology, Media & Telecommunications Industry Practice:

What are three key ingredients a B.C. startup needs to be as successful as Hootsuite?

While we can’t comment on any specific companies, we have seen great success from a number of emerging technology companies when they have these three things:

• Willingness and drive to push the envelope in terms of their product and strategy
• Strong leadership team who are 100 per cent bought into the idea, are dedicated to making it a reality and won’t take no for an answer.
• There are a lot of companies who have amazing ideas, but were ahead of their time; perhaps the market or consumers were not ready for them. In the end, luck and timing play a huge factor as well.

What kind of resources are available in B.C. for startups looking for the type of incubation model Hootsuite, Global Relay and Avigilon provides?

I can’t comment on those companies specifically, but there are a lot of great mentors, incubators and accelerators to help start-ups in BC. There are resources to help emerging entrepreneurs as young as high school-aged, to experienced entrepreneurs who are looking to grow their second or third business. Overall there is amazing support in the BC tech community.

What does the five year forecast for tech companies in B.C. look like? More competition? Greater investment opportunities? Out sourcing, etc?

Achievements of this year’s Fast 50 recipients are an indication that Canadian technology companies can excel here on home soil, with this year’s list achieving an average five-year growth rate of 4,736 per cent – a significant increase from last year’s average five-year growth rate of 832 per cent.

Entrepreneurs can get good valuations in Canada. With the right business model, combined with support from investors and government, home-grown companies will stay and the outlook looks to improve.

According to Deloitte’s annual survey of CEOs of Technology Fast 50 companies, we found that a strong majority (89%) of respondents believe the ability to access capital for technology companies has gotten better or remained the same in the past five years. Fast-growing companies used to look solely to the US to secure sources of capital when domestic venture capital dried up after 2000, but the pendulum is now swinging back into balance. That’s the result of recently added investments to the Canadian technology investing sector. Even though there is increased access to capital, emerging companies still require the help of capital investment or corporate supporters who believe in them to get their ideas off the ground.

Our Companies-to-watch category of the Deloitte Technology Fast 50 awards recognizes promising companies under five years old. This year we had four winners in BC (BitLit, Corvus Energy, Trulioo and Unbounce), out of fifteen across the entire country. This is a clear statement that there’s great potential in BC.

Feature Image: HootSuite