NEWS

- July 15, 2010: Honourable Iain Black, BC Minister for Small Business, Technology and Economic Development, Honourable Ben Stewart, BC Minister of Community and Rural Development and Kelowna MLA Norm Letnick visited ORIC White Lake, DRAO and ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre.

Gary Symons (CEO Vericorder Technology), Ministers Black, Stewart, MLA Letnick, Jason Richards (CEO of Vineyard Networks) and Martin Yuill (Director ORIC).

-June 25th, 2010: ORIC received a $200,000 grant form NRC-IRAP to support technology SME's in the Okanagan Valley. More...

- June 23rd, 2010: Peter joined the Penticton Economic Development Advisory Committee (EDAC).

- June 5th, 2010: ORIC's President Peter Haubrich became Honorary Fellow of the Okanagan College at the convocation ceremony of the graduating class 2010.

- June 1st, 2010: clickTributes signed up as first client of the ORIC Penticton Innovation Centre. clickTributes provides web-based marketing solutions that help funeral service professionals save time, cut costs and work smarter. Every day, funeral directors depend on clickTributes to add value to their personal services and assist client families in the grieving/healing process. clickTributes fresh approach to obituaries, condolences, web casting and online memorialization is transforming funeral traditions.

- May 5, 2010: Peter Haubrich will become Honorary Fellow of the Okanagan College at the spring convocation ceremony. Press release is here.

- May 5, 2010: ORIC became a node in the Canadian Digital Media Network CDMN. The network supports digital media companies and will strengthen our upcoming cluster in the Okanagan Valley.The press release is here.

- April 8, 2010: We welcome four new tenants of ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre: VP Process Inc, OKBC TV, Qasper and Pixel Savvy.

- March 18, 2010: The second  High-Tech Round Table was successfully held at our new location in downtown Penticton. Over 30 persons participated. SOS LINK a Penticton high-tech start-up got the naming rights for our plaza: SOS-LINK Innovation Plaza. See also article in the Penticton Western News

-  March 3, 2010: ORIC Penticton mentioned in the BC Inventors Society.

- February 25, 2010: Sharon Shepherd, Mayor of Kelowna and Director of SIDIT announced a $150,000 funding for the expansion of ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre. Present at the ceremony were Hon. Ron Cannan MP for Kelowna-Lake Country, Luby Pow CEO of SIDIT, ORIC's clients, anchor tenants and representatives of the media.

- February 23, 2010: A new IEEE subsection was established to recognize the emergence of the Okanagan Valley as a major technology centre in the Province of BC. Dr. Julian Cheng (UBC-O) was appointed as Chair and Peter Haubrich as Vice-Chair of the new IEEE Okanagan subsection. More.

- February 4, 2010: Hosted a "Face Time" workshop entitled "Entrepreneurial Marketing" at ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre with Roberts G Keeling of Roberts G Keeling & Associates. Great conversation and wonderful feedback. "Face Time" workshops are designed to support the growth ambitions of innovators and entrepreneurs.

- December 12, 2009: Hon. Stockwell Day announced a $170,000 grant to establish ORIC's 3rd high-tech incubator in downtown Penticton. The funding comes for the Community Adjustment Fund as part of the Federal Governments' Economic Action Plan. See the press release and pictures.

- December 9, 2009: Effective December 21, 2009 OSTEC will be moving its office to co-locate with the Okanagan Research & Innovation Centre (ORIC), at Suite 108 - 1405 St. Paul Street in Kelowna. This move is a first step in forging a stronger strategic alliance with ORIC to better serve the needs of the Okanagan technology community from start-up through to maturity as world-class companies. More

- December 8, 2009: Funding announcement for ORIC Penticton Innovation Centre on Saturday December 12 from 10:15 - 11:30 with Hon. Minister Stockwell Day. This event is by invitation only.

- December 4, 2009: "Penticton's right turn toward business" in the Business Examiner. Note: Peter Hallbrecht should be Peter Haubrich!

- December 2, 2009: Hosted a "Face Time" legal roundtable with Knowledge Partner, Pushor Mitchell, at ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre entitled "Basic Legal Issues and Documents for Early Stage Ventures". Included an introduction to Corporate Due Diligence. Great content, wonderful feedback, a firm platform for the future roll-out of these value-adding legal roundtable sessions.

- November 26, 2009: Successful event with Angel of the Year Mike Volker talking about "Winning with Angels" at ORIC Kelowna.

- November 20, 2009: Groundbreaking event at the new Centre of Excellence in Penticton with Hon. Stockwell Day, Hon. Bill Barisoff and Hon. John Slater in attendance. Fundraising campaign for $5 million started.

-November 18, 2009: Charley Hampton held a successful "Face Time" workshop entitled "Building Powerful Business Relationships" at ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre

- November 17, 2009: ORIC hosted the Okanagan Angel Network event with 3 start-up companies presenting their investment opportunity.

- November 4, 2009: ORIC announces local law firm Pushor Mitchell LLP as "knowledge partner". See media release.

- October 17, 2009: The ORIC Board of Directors elected David Arsenault, Economic Development Services Penticton to be member of ORIC's Board. David has a broad economic development experience and represents Penticton on the Board.

- October 14, 2009: ORIC's client Vericorder Technologies received an NRC-IRAP grant of $250,000 and Vineyard Networks received a grant of $500,000 . The grants were presented at ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre by MP Ron Cannan. See press release

Derek Lownsbrough VP Engineering Vineyard                          Gary Symons CEO Vericorder

- October 9, 2009: At the Open House at the Okanagan College the final design of the new Centre of Excellence in Penticton was shown.

- October 8, 2009: Hi -Tech Round Table for the South Okanagan was a great success. Please see the media release.

- October 7, 2009: Southern Interior Innovation Fund launched to benefit the region. More...

- October 5, 2009: Presentation about ORIC and future outlook to the Penticton City Council. Video is here.

- October 1, 2009: welcome to our new employee Wilfred Mueller who joins ORIC as Senior R&D Engineer. Wilfred has a degree in electrical engineering and a broad experience working in the high-tech industry for a variety of companies.

- September 28, 2009: our client Vineyard Networks featured in NetworkWorld magazine.

- September 26, 2009: ORIC, PSST, Vericorder and Cutting Edge Concepts participated in the annual Open House at DRAO

- September 23, 2009: Presentation to the Penticton Rotary about ORIC and ORIC's expansion plans for the South Okanagan.

- September 3, 2009: ORIC's client Vineyard Networks made it to the final 10 in the New Ventures BC competition.

- August 31, 2009: Martin Yuill, Director ORIC Kelowna,  will moderate a panel session on incubation/acceleration at the BCIC /CONNECT '09 event on October 19th. Sharon Barnes, CEO of RFind and successful graduate of ORIC, will also participate in the panel discussion. Details are here.

- August 17, 2009: Dr. Tom McKaskill's new e-Book on Raising Angel & Venture Capital Finance can be downloaded here for free

- August 16, 2009: ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre supports Twitter Business Day (TwitBizDay) - an initiative to connect the Kelowna business community using social networking tools

- August 8, 2009:  ORIC Kelowna Director, Martin Yuill, quoted in an article in the Okanagan Saturday discussing the impact of the recession on Okanagan companies

- August 1, 2009: OSTEC and ORIC announce the hiring of a Business Coach for the Okanagan Mentors Program. The Coach Mark Payne is located at ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre. More..

- July 23, 2009: Pamela Nelson held a very successful face time seminar on marketing.

- July 10, 2009: Basil Peters posted a HD video of his talk on Early Exits on his AngelBlog website.

- June 24th, 2009: Peter Haubrich, President ORIC was elected as Board member of OSTEC for a third 2 year term. More is here.

- June 16th, 2009: Vineyard Networks advances to round 3 of the New Ventures BC Competition. More

- June 8th, 2009: We welcome our new Administrative Assistant joining us at the ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre

- May 21, 2009: At is Annual General Meeting, Garey Hovey was elected as a non-voting Board member representing NRC-DRAO. The Board thanked the outgoing member Bob Bissell for his contribution over the past years to the success of ORIC. Bob was one of the founding Board members of ORIC.

- May 6, 2009: ORIC enrolled in Microsoft BizSpark program to support software start-up companies. More information is here.

- April 8, 2009: Funding announcement of 28 million $ from the Provincial and Federal Governments and the institution for the Okanagan College - Penticton Campus new Centre of Excellence in Green Building Technology. This will have a tremendous impact on the South Okanagan. ORIC will have a business incubator in the new building. The project will start in June 2009. More... ...

April 2nd, 2009: Robert Fine, Board Director ORIC, was named Hounorary Fellow 2009 by the Okanagan College. Congratulations to Robert. More...

- March 27, 2009 Kelowna. At the official Ribbon Cutting Ceremony and Grand Opening of the ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre Honourable Ron Cannan, MP for Kelowna - Lake Country announced Western Economic Diversification of Canada financial contribution of $200,000 for ORIC's new facility in Kelowna. Ron also announced a financial contribution from NRC-IRAP of $50,800.
In her address, her Worship Sharon Shepherd Mayor for Kelowna referred to an earlier announcement of a grant from SIDIT of $150,000 for ORIC Kelowna.
At the celebration over 90 guests from the Okanagan Valley and BC where present. Peter Haubrich, ORIC's President announced the graduation of ORIC's first very successful client RFind Systems. Press clippings can be found here. A video clip of the event is here

Honourable MP Ron Cannan, ORIC's President Peter Haubrich,
Her Worship Sharon Shepherd Mayor of Kelowna and Assistant
Deputy Minister WD Gerry Salembier performed the Ribbon Cutting.

- March 12, 2009: Peter Haubrich was runner up in this year's Silicon Vineyard Innovation Awards in the category Science & Technology Leadership Awards.

- March 9, 2009: "ORIC plans to replicate success in Kelowna". Interesting article about ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre in the Business Examiner and interview with Martin Yuill. Read more...

- March 2, 2009: CPlates Inc. CEO Isaac Kamen joined ORIC's pre-incubation program. Isaac will work with ORIC's mentors to bring his company to the incubator ready stage.

- February 26, 2009: We had our first "Innovation Plaza Event" with guest speaker Mark Donougher from Oury Clark. The event attracted quite a number of visitors.

-  February 23, 2009: We welcome Erin Ponech who joined ORIC today as Executive Assistant. Erin will replace Anna who will leave ORIC on Maternity leave.

- January 27, 2009: ORIC is a finalist of 2009 Silicon Vineyard awards in the category Science and Technology Community Leadership Award.  ORIC's incubator clients RFind Systems, VeriCorder Technology and Vineyard Networks were also nominated as finalist. For more information see www.ostec.ca.

- January 22, 2009: our incubator client PSST won the prestigious WorkSafe BC Health and Safety Innovations Award in Prince George.

- January 6, 2009: UViC co-op students Jonathan Cronk and Colin Wilson joined ORIC for a 4 month term. Jonathan and Colin will work on our Wireless Sensor Network Applied Research project.

- December 10, 2008: we got our new sign on the building.

- December 8th, 2008: The Economic Development Commission of the Central Okanagan issued a news release about ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre

- December 1st, 2008: Experienced Business Incubator Manager Martin Yuill joins ORIC to lead the newly created ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre. Martin arrives in the Okanagan from South Africa, where he was instrumental in building the "Innovation Hub". See press release here

- November 18, 2008: Serial entrepreneur Ron Jost started as Entrepreneur in Residence

- November 17, 2008: Vineyard Networks wins Best Exhibitor award at British Columbia Vancouver Angel Forum. More...
Vericorder Technologies received 4th place (out of 30) of Best Presentation award and 2nd place as Best Pre-Revenue company. More... See press release here

- November 12, 2008: Kristine Skogg joined ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre as Administrative Assistant.

- November 5, 2008: created ORIC Network as group on LinkedIn. To sign up: click here 
- November 3, 2008: ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre is open for business 
Vericorder Technologies, Okanagan Innovation Fund and the Southern Interior Innovation Fund, Vineyard Networks and NRC-IRAP moved into the Innovation Centre.

- October 22, 2008 - ORIC and Vineyard Networks signed a lease agreement. Vineyard Networks will move in the incubator
as one of our first tenants.

- September 11, 2008- SIDIT News release:  Major grant to promote high-tech industry. SIDIT's Directors Mayor Sharon Shepherd, Mayor Jake Kimberley and CEO Ron Baker will announce a major funding grant for ORIC Kelowna at a media event on September 12.

- September 2nd, 2008: The renovations for our ORIC Kelowna incubator started.
Please check the pictures section on this site to get a sneak preview.

- July 28, 2008: Our client Waveteq Communications earned Industry Canada certification. Waveteq Communications Inc. a British Columbia, Canada based, manufacturer and designer of ruggedised multifunctional WiFi devices and developer of superior WiMax devices, announces the completion of the Certification Process for Industry Canada and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the United States. More...

- July 23, 2008: We are currently setting up the ORIC Kelowna Innovation Centre as part of our strategy to have multiple locations in the Okanagan Valley for business incubation and acceleration. We have just finished the recruitment process for the Director ORIC Kelowna.

- June 17, 2008: at ORIC's third Annual General Meeting a new Board was elected. We welcome the new members: John Drope - Managing Director Okanagan Innovation Fund; Robert Fine - Economic Development Commission Central Okanagan and Tony Edwards Horsepower Intellectual Property Law. The new Board expressed its thanks for the support of the outgoing Board members Dr. Jacek Wojcik and Jack van der Star.

-  May 20, 2008: Thomas Rozek joined ORIC as senior Firmware Developer. Thomas has gained a lot of valuable experience in software engineering. He will be working on client projects.

-  May 15, 2008: ORIC's latest client VeriCorder Technology joined our incubator. VeriCorder Technology is dedicated to bringing trustworthy, advanced recording and editing technology to the Smartphone and PDA marketplace.

- April 10, 2008: ORIC's President received the prestigious "Member of the Year" Award. At the 2008 Silicon Vineyard Innovation Awards Ceremony, hosted by OSTEC, Kathleen Wallace of SkyTrac presented Peter this award. The event was visited by over 200 delegates from the Okanagan and BC. Some pictures are posted here.
At the same event Dr. Tom Landecker accepted the Science & Technology Community Leadership award for NRC-DRAO

 - January 28, 2008: Kevin Bradshaw joined ORIC as second Hardware/Firmware engineer. Kevin graduated from UViC in electrical engineering. He will be working on client projects and brings to ORIC experience in several fields.

- November 5, 2007: Mischa Steiner-Jovic joined ORIC as Hardware/Firmware engineer. Mischa graduated from UViC in electrical engineering and brings already relevant skills in hardware and firmware engineering to ORIC.

- June 22, 2007: At ORIC's second Annual General Meeting  a new Board of Directors was elected. Doug Corbisley (Investment Review Committee Okanagan Innovation Fund) was elected as Chair of the Board, Bob Bissell is the new treasurer, Jim Maynard (President WINLAB), Will Gow (Executive Director OSTEC) are new directors. The new board expressed it thanks for the support to the outgoing members Kathleen Wallace and Diana Groffen

May 23, 2007: Dr. Richard Klukas, assistant professor at UBC-O was elected as new board member. Richard will take over the position that was held by Dr. Spiro Yannacopolous who resigned from his position. The board expressed his thanks to Spiro for his support of ORIC.

April 16, 2007: On May 1st, Dr. Ahmad Chamseddine will join ORIC as Senior Research Engineer. Ahmad received his PhD and MSc in Electrical Engineering and worked in Canada for several organisations before joining ORIC. He will support our client companies as well as start ORIC's Applied Research program.

- January 15, 2007: Anna Wolleben joined ORIC as Executive Assistant

- December 18, 2006: ORIC signed up as a member of the Wireless Industry Partnership WIP. More...

-  December 8, 2006: ORIC now a member of the Canada Network of Wireless Centres: CWCNet. The purpose of the organization is to support SME's in the wireless domain. More at www.cwcnet.ca

- November 10, 2006: ORIC was officially opened during the ribbon cutting ceremony performed by Hon. Stockwell Day, Dr. Pierre Coulombe and Kathleen Wallace. About 50 invited guests from the Okanagan Valley as well as from Vancouver and Ottawa participated in the celebration. See also the press release and coverage on CHBC TV. More..

- November 7, 2006: Dr. Spiro Yannacopoulos, Director of the School of Engineering of UBC-Okanagan, was elected as new board member. Spiro recently joined UBC-O and will strengthen our relation with the School of Engineering.

November 1, 2006: SnowSports Interactive signed up as second tenant of ORIC's incubator.

- September 28, 2006: ORIC's first incubator company RFind wins the first prize in prestigious Telus New Ventures BC Competition. More..

- September 25, 2006: ORIC will have a booth at the second annual economic summit of the Okanagan Partnership on October 6, 2006

- September 23, 2006: The annual Open House at NRC-DRAO attracted a lot of visitors to the ORIC booth.

- September 19, 2006: The first Annual General Meeting was held at the new location of SkyTrac Systems in Kelowna. The ORIC Board expressed its thanks for the support of the two leaving Board members: David Jones and Andrew Hay. Philip Ashman (assistant Professor at Okanagan College) was elected as new Board member. Philip brings to ORIC his expertise in networking and telecommunication as well as his experience in creating the Okanagan Broadband Network (ORNet).

September 11, 2006: ORIC has become a non-core member of the Canada Network of Wireless Centres CWCnet. This Centre co-ordinates the support for SME's in the wireless domain and is managed by the Communication Research Centre in Ottawa.

- February 28, 2006: The name change was approved. ORIC now stands for
Okanagan Research & Innovation Centre

- December 8, 2005:  The Board of Directors appointed Dr. Jacek Wojcik, Chairman & CEO of APREL and President of Spectrum Sciences Institute as a new Board member. Jacek brings to ORIC the connection to the Ottawa region as well as his experience and network in the wireless industry. The Board also nominated ORIC's Executive Director Peter Haubrich as an ex-officio member of the Board

- October 21, 2005: The Board of Directors appointed David Jones, Associate Director of the University of British Columbia-University Industry Liaison Office (UBC-UILO) as new Board member. David joins the Board with his extensive knowledge of issues related to Intellectual Property, Technology Transfer and Commercialization, his experience in supporting spin-off companies and his network of persons and companies in the Greater Vancouver area.

- October 12, 2005: ORIC was present at the Grand Opening of the new building of WindWard Software in Penticton (wws5.com), more

- September 24, 2005 The Open House at DRAO was a great success and ORIC had a lot of exposure, more

- September 14, 2005: ORIC will announce at the upcoming Open House its first incubator tenant: RFind Systems Inc.. For more information see press release.

- September 9, 2005: At the extraordinary general meeting, ORIC's first Board of Directors was elected. ORIC has a powerful board with representatives from industry, government and academia.

- August 31, 2005: ORIC will be present at NRC-DRAO's annual Open House on Saturday, September 24, 2005. Details can be found here.

- August 15, 2005:  ORIC has been incorporated under the BC society law !

© Okanagan Research & Innovation Centre 2005. All Rights Reserved                                                                                    Updated: July 23, 2010