The Alacrity BC Cleantech Initiative

Imagine a net-zero economy, made possible by clean technology

British Columbia is a clean technology hub and through Alacrity’s global network and demand-driven approach, we are attracting the talent, opportunities, and investments needed to build the strong tech ecosystem that will help us accelerate our transition towards a net-zero economy. As human understanding of the climate crisis and its effects increases globally, we’re here to help transform increased public attention and urgency into tangible benefits for companies trying to address the most pressing environmental issues.

Defining cleantech

Cleantech can be a challenging term to define. Broadly speaking, the term is used to refer to products or services that somehow improve upon, and have a more positive environmental impact, than existing technologies. For the purposes of our Cleantech Program, we work with ethical, mission-driven cleantech companies whose products help to, for example, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, produce renewable energy, recycle existing products or materials, or address known industrial environmental issues.

Meet our team

The Alacrity Cleantech team is on a mission to support British Columbia’s cleantech companies as they scale-up and commercialize. Read about each of our team members to find out what they bring to Alacrity Cleantech.

We believe different perspectives make Alacrity Cleantech a better organization. We’re committed to building a diverse, equitable and inclusive environment where our team members feel that they belong.

All

Advisors

Cleantech

Burak-Evren

Cleantech Program Manager

Burak works with Alacrity’s Cleantech portfolio companies to address challenges in target markets (Mexico, Singapore, India and Northern Europe), and facilitates their marketing and business development efforts.

Burak leads our Cleantech program’s strategy, and manages and oversees all activities relating to the Cleantech portfolio. He is dedicated to turning the Cleantech industry into a field investors recognize and are excited to invest in so that environmental results and commercial results can be achieved in parallel. He has both a BA of Business Management from the University of Istanbul and a MA of Global Management from Royal Roads University. He is a seasoned professional with over 25 years of experience in Marketing, Product Development, and Digital Transformation.

He started his career at British American Tobacco Holland, and became a brand manager for BAT in Central Asia. Through the years, he has taken on different roles in local and global organizations. He has worked for McCann Erickson Worldgroup, Fox International Channels, Motorola; and a few local giants in Turkey like Turkish Telecom, Dogan Holding and Boyner Holding. He managed to set up sales and marketing operations, stewarding projects worth over a hundred million USD and more. Under his management, Turkey’s first IPTV platform Tivibu received many rewards and achieved a healthy market share. In the last decade, he was holding senior and C-level positions in Marketing and Digital Product Development.

Through Alacrity's Cleantech Program, he has helped over 10 founders raise funds and grow their companies to achieve the initiatives 2018-2020 targets. This resulted in a new Program that will bring in new export potential and investment to BC. He diligently serves entrepreneurs so they are at the cutting edge of tech, and service development for the improvement of the community and environment that we all share.

Burak has established a reputation as a professional and academician. He worked as a lecturer at Kadir Has University in Istanbul, and currently teaches at Royal Roads University in Victoria, BC. His teachings included intercultural studies, digital entrepreneurship, innovation management, e-commerce, and e-commerce. Burak is a keynote speaker in tech events about new media, artificial intelligence, digital transformation, and he is also one of the founders of the Turkish Digital Transformation Association.

Burak Evren

Vice President of Impact and Sustainability

Devon DeLarge

Cleantech Program Administrator

Devon’s areas of expertise lie in entrepreneurship through team supervision and leadership, government relations, and incident command. With experience in logistics and project management, Devon handles our Cleantech Program’s administration and marketing. This includes managing data collection and reporting, sourcing and consulting with potential cleantech program candidates, as well as established portfolio companies.

Devon has a Bachelor's of Science degree from the University of Victoria with a Major in Psychology, Minor in Biology, and a Diploma of Art and Science in Psychology from Camosun College.

At the beginning of his career, he applied his education to Emergency Medical Response, leading a ten person team in Mountain Rescue and First Aid. Further, Devon branched out as an entrepreneur, launching his own retail athletic company as well as a consulting and web development agency.

Devon moved into working in legislative governance where he was involved in supporting legislation for the CleanBC program and Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (Holodomor) Memorial Day in British Columbia. He was attracted to Alacrity because the organization is consistently at the leading edge of environmental, social, and governance trends, enabling him to utilize his skills and drive forth more positive change.

Devon DeLarge

Cleantech Program and Media Coordinator

Silvia Cardenas

ESG Project Manager

Silvia is working on changing the ESG landscape in Alacrity and helping the Cleantech area understand how to analyze and manage ESG risks and opportunities. Silvia is passionate about the sustainability challenges that small and medium enterprises and the supply chain currently pose, and how these factors need to be addressed to achieve a net zero transition –very much interested in helping organizations create impact and transform the communities in which they operate. She holds an MBA in Sustainable Innovation from UVic.

For over a decade she has worked in the Fashion and Apparel industry with deep experience in the manufacturing, sourcing, and development of garments for highly recognized European and North American brands. Silvia’s strong business background has led her to hold positions with great responsibility in the overall operational and financial success of many fashion collections – making a significant contribution to the profitability and quality of these.

Silvia’s worldly view stems from her own background having grown up in South America and attaining education while living in various European countries. She graduated with her bachelor’s degree in International Business from the University of Eafit (Colombia, South America) in 2003. Has experience working with different cultures worldwide, loves learning from others and collaborating with different teams. Silvia has volunteered on different Boards and Committees within her community and children’s education institutions – and has been a valued member, advisor, and contributor.

Silvia Cardenas

ESG Project Director

Martijn Schouten

Northern Europe Advisor

Martijn Schouten is Alacrity Cleantech’s in-market advisor for Northern Europe. Martijn is based in Utrecht, the Netherlands and brings decades of valuable experience in business development in the marine industry.

Born on a boat and raised in a maritime family, it is perhaps unsurprising that Martijn has spent such a great deal of his career working in the marine sector. Through his work with one of the leading maritime equipment companies in the world (their work focus involves dredging, mining, offshore renewables, and oil and gas), he has gained experience organizing global shipbuilding activities and overseeing acquisitions and the launch of new offices on each continent as the company’s Director of Mergers and Acquisitions. Martijn has also served as global sales director, putting him in charge of managing half a billion dollars worth of revenue, and has served as CEO/CFO of a subsea contractor focused on renewable markets and technologies like autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) and artificial intelligence (AI).

During his career, Martijn also established a dredging and offshore mining equipment company called IHC Mining. The company had offices in The Netherlands, South Africa, and Australia and brought in annual sales of 20 million euros. Through that experience, he was introduced to Canadian subsea technology companies and learned that many Canadian companies are ahead of what is available on the global market. Today, Martijn serves as CEO of a corporate start-up which he launched himself and which has developed some of the most sophisticated subsea equipment in the world.

Martijn chooses to work with Alacrity Cleantech as an advisor because he is obsessed with technology and Earth’s oceans and is convinced that technology holds the key to a better and cleaner world.

Martijn Schouten

Northern Europe Advisor

Federico Goroztieta

Mexico/Latin America Advisor

Federico Goroztieta is Alacrity Cleantech’s in-market advisor for Mexico. Federico is a Civil Engineer by trade and is interested in any industry that helps advance and improve human societies and lives. Federico has started and scaled a variety of companies over the course of his career, including a construction company, a furniture manufacturer, a data processing firm, a creative studio, and a golf academy. His guiding belief is that all failure teaches resilience and that resilience is the character trait that leads people to success.

Federico has enjoyed an influential career as a Business Advisor to institutions and corporations of all sorts, focusing on enabling them to optimize their performance as they grow and strengthen their competitive position in their market. He has honed his business diplomacy and high-level project management skills over many years of identifying emerging opportunities in diverse sectors and his intimate understanding of both Canadian and Mexican business culture and society makes him a perfect aid to any Canadian company looking to explore opportunities in Mexico or Latin America.

Federico served as Head of Economic Affairs at the Consulate General of Mexico in Vancouver, BC from 2001 to 2010 and served as CEO of TechBa Vancouver, an international business accelerator funded by the Mexican Federal Ministry of Economy, in 2010. Federico is the founder and acting president of Derivative Integrated Solutions Society and Malabar Studio. Over the course of his career, he has supported and advanced more than two hundred small to medium sized Mexican companies, more than thirty Central and South American companies, eighteen Canadian companies, five American companies, and two Spanish companies, altogether selling more than $750 million in USD.

Federico takes inspiration from the legacy of Sir Terry Matthews and appreciates Alacrity Cleantech’s focus on leveraging relationships, new and established, to connect Canadian clean technology companies with new opportunities and revenue streams.

Federico Goroztieta

Mexico/Latin America Advisor

Munish Saini

India Advisor

Munish Saini is Alacrity Cleantech’s in-market advisor for India. Munish is formally educated in Electronics and Communications and has held manager and director roles at a variety of technology and electronics companies throughout his career.

Munish has played a crucial role in many technological advancements in the Indian cleantech industry, including designing and developing a variety of technologies or introducing innovations to the Indian market. His concept promotion and performance optimization skills have been key to streamlining businesses and elevating technologies of all sorts. Munish’s work on developing the world’s first Vehicle Black Box designed to safeguard vehicles from theft highlights his visionary and strategic skills.

Munish brings to Alacrity his rich history of results-driven, innovative, and strategic business development. He loves to work on improving products and services and enjoys diving into new partnerships with companies and clientele around the world. He highly values his work with Alacrity because it brings him closer to new technologies and companies as he finds ways to bring their products to new markets.

Tuck Wai Lee

Singapore/ASEAN Advisor

Tuck Wai Lee is Alacrity Cleantech’s in-market advisor for Singapore and the ASEAN region. Tuck is currently the Managing Director of Upconverge and is particularly knowledgeable about the water industry, climate adaptation, clean energy, and sustainability.

Tuck brings twenty years of technical experience involving delivering strategy, engineering studies, master planning, concept design for detailed engineering and construction projects, and operations optimization. He also has considerable business experience in client service management, business development, consulting operations, technology management, and talent development and management.

Tuck chooses to work with Alacrity Cleantech because of the broad and exciting range of technologies, services, and solutions that he gets to learn about and help improve. While the context for each portfolio company is always a little different, he finds that the work taps into his broad industry knowledge and experience, pushing him to continue thinking creatively and strategically about how to advance new technologies and businesses. He is passionate about introducing new companies to the Singapore and Southeast Asian markets and loves that his role involves both learning and teaching.

Cec Primeau

Senior Advisor, Canada

Cec Primeau is a senior mentor for the Alacrity Canada Cleantech Program. Based in Canada, Cec works closely with Federico to pursue opportunities for cleantech companies in the Mexican market. He spends his time with multiple portfolio companies to provide advice on business modeling and financial modeling, as well as market discovery and business development.

Cec currently serves as Principle of Solutions Plus Consulting in addition to his role with Alacrity Cleantech. Cec is a true business veteran, with decades of strategic information technology and financial and management experience in a vast array of industries. He has served in senior management positions such as Chief Financial Officer, Chief Operations Officer, and Chief Innovation Officer in a number of sectors. In his role as an eBusiness Principal at PricewaterhouseCoopers in the late ’90s, he was a thought leader who helped his firm understand how the business world would be impacted by emerging internet and web-based technologies.

More recently, Cec served as CFO of a clean technology company and helped take the company from startup to profit generation within just a few years. He also oversaw the successful sale of a telecom software company as COO and CFO.

Cec’s work with Alacrity Cleantech’s portfolio companies centers primarily around providing business strategy and fundraising consultancy. He is integral to Alacrity’s ongoing work to evaluate and bring on new companies for the portfolio, as well as managing relationships with partners and Provincial and Federal Government stakeholders.

Peter Van der Gracht

Senior Advisor, Canada

Peter Van der Gracht is a senior mentor for Alacrity Canada’s Cleantech program, supporting portfolio companies with market penetration, business model development, and alternative financing solutions. Based in Canada, Peter also works closely with in-market advisors and cleantech companies pursuing opportunities in the India and Northern Europe markets.

Peter, a Master of Electrical Engineering and Applied Sciences by trade, is a powerful resource for cleantech company development. He currently serves as a member, chairman, or director of a significant number of boards and provides independent financial and management advice to multiple companies at Alacrity and through other organizations.

With more than forty years of business experience in a variety of industries ranging from natural resources to technology and telecommunications to retail and cleantech, he has a wealth of business acumen and established relationships with a diverse and expansive global network of business leaders.

Peter excels at making connections between companies, finding new customers, pitching investors, and folding in partners, connecting very valuable dots for companies both small and large. He also has experience managing operational build-outs, acquisitions, and buy-outs and has successfully led and exited multiple technology companies headquartered across North America with global footprints.

Peter works with Alacrity because he values giving back to the business community and to the environment. “Working with a not-for-profit that works to support entrepreneurs and inventors and green the planet at the same time feels like a pretty worthwhile calling to me.”

Peter Van der Gracht

Senior Advisor, Canada

Golriz Fattahi

Vice President of Operations

Golriz works with internal and external stakeholders to support access to funding for programming and education. She also acts as our head recruiter, and is our culture enthusiast, providing a safe space for collaborative efforts.

Golriz holds a BA from Simon Fraser University and is a seasoned Operations Manager with over 15 years of experience in Retail, Recruitment, Research, Non for Profit, Fundraising, Small Business, and Entrepreneurship. Her areas of expertise are People Management (HR), Recruitment, Government Relations and Grant Writing. Something Alacrity Canada does a lot of in order to fund our Programs and Initiatives. Before Alacrity, Golriz worked in research within the recruitment industry as a Project Manager. Prior to that, she worked as a junior estimator in a construction company as well as a store manager for Starbucks – where she first realized how good her people skills were.

Golriz is a dedicated project manager, delivering exceptional programs through various Alacrity initiatives, including the launch and expansion of the Entreprenurship@Alacrity program in 2009. Currently, Golriz works with the Digital Marketing Bootcamp team and the BC Cleantech Initiative group on a number of program offerings, including the delivery of the Recycled Plastics Manufacturing Stimulus Fund. Golriz is also in charge of reporting to the government and funding partners for the above mentioned programs.

She is actively involved in building and growing the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion principals at Alacrity, bringing that focus to all portfolio companies, and is a member of Canadian Accelerator Incubator Network.

Golriz Fattahi

Chief Operations Officer

Richard Egli

CEO

Richard manages the operation and strategic direction of the Alacrity Foundation. As a team member, he advises multiple portfolio companies by contributing to investment decisions and connecting them to potential partners and investors.

Richard is one part visionary, one part diplomat. His role requires him to turn his attention forward, in search of meaningful opportunities and partnerships. Focussing on those that add value to Alacrity’s portfolio of companies, and evolve Alacrity’s scope and goals. In parallel, Richard hones in, sourcing and working alongside the next generation of tech leaders. He has shown great success in assembling teams, and leading them into strategic alignment, through pitfalls, over hurdles, and into the light.

Over the past few years Richard has also led the effort behind the Alacrity Investor Readiness Program, which has brought more than $220M CAD of investment into the BC technology ecosystem; and spearheaded the initiative behind opening Alacrity’s Shanghai office, meaning cross-border opportunity and investment.

Richard holds a B.Com in Entrepreneurship from Royal Roads University and a MBA from the University of Victoria with a specialization in real estate, venture capital and finance. He has also spent 10 years involved in real estate development in various capacities: as a builder, project manager, and investor, across Western Canada and the USA. Beginning in 2005, he began managing a $40M+ budget for a 74 lot subdivision project in Kelowna, BC to successful completion. He continues pursuing real estate projects in Victoria by developing and providing unique work spaces to the growing local technology community.

While Richard is immensely proud of the results and impact his team has achieved in the last decade, for Richard, Alacrity is just getting started. Being an entrepreneur at heart means that he is invigorated by newness and being ahead of the game.

Alongside his work at Alacrity, Richard is a founding investor and managing partner of Cindicates Investment Fund , is on the board of Directors for Capital Investment Network, among others; and volunteers for the Power to Be Charity and Hero Work.

Owen Matthews

Chairman - Alacrity Canada & Alacrity Academy

Owen helps lead the vision and direction of Alacrity Canada, and is a major contributor to the local technology community in Victoria. He donates his time and resources to the multiple groups within and outside Alacrity’s portfolio.

By the time Owen was leaving his hometown of Kanata, Ottawa, it had grown from a small town into the largest technology centre in Canada. Due to this influence, Owen studied computer sciences and psychology at the University of Victoria while running a web design firm and graphic arts studio.

He founded NewHeights Software, a pioneer in enterprise unified communication products, which was acquired by CounterPath Corporation. When it was publicly listed on Nasdaq, it was valued at $110M value, and produced tens of millions in annual revenue.

Following this successful venture, Owen joined his family’s technology investment firm, Wesley Clover. As a General Partner, Owen was offered the operational support to search for new investments, but no budget. Fuelled by his entrepreneurial spirit, Owen looked at the growth white-space in the market, and that was British Columbia. He collaborated with the Government and the Province’s universities to create an educational program to nurse budding tech entrepreneurs, and Alacrity Canada was born. Over the course of his career, Owen has founded dozens of companies that have generated at least $350M in value for shareholders and driven $60M in annual sales.

Owen also sits on several technology boards, including SaaSquatch, HYAS, Pretio Interactive, Encepta, Quantotech, and Talkative.

See who we're working with

Alacrity Canada acknowledges and is grateful to be working on the traditional and ancestral territory of the Lkwungen peoples (Songhees and Esquimalt), where the Songhees, Esquimalt, and WSÁNEĆ peoples’ relationship with the land continues today.