Montreal Tech Watch

Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Philippe K. Chrun, an entrepreneur, a MBA student, and consultant at the Consultant at Concordia Small Business Consulting Bureau. The guest post is published here in order to bridge the tech community in Montreal with what’s being done in universities, and also because it’s potentially interesting for any tech entrepreneur in Montreal. Philippe can be contacted at p_chrun@jmsb.concordia.ca or 514-991-2875

A lot of entrepreneurs call us at the Concordia Small Business Consulting Bureau because they want us to write their business plan. The first question I ask them is: what are you going to be using your business plan for? 90% of them say they need a business plan to present to investors so that they can raise money (a “money” business plan). 10% of them say they need a business plan that they can actually follow to generate cash from operations (a “plan” business plan). Our opinion at the CSBCB is that a “plan” business plan is incorrectly undervalued in the eyes of most entrepreneurs, but the since the client is king, let me show you the money.

Below is a simple list of Montreal investors. We are currently building a more detailed list at the CSBCB which we use to target investors for our clients. Of course, if anyone knows of investors which we missed, we would love for you to add it in the comments section.

In terms of investment targets, angels look to invest in start-ups, banks look to invest in revenue-generating companies with liquid assets (e.g. A/R and inventories), government funds look to invest in local entrepreneurs, private equity looks to invest in multi-million $ companies that can be restructured and/or refinanced, and venture capitalists look to invest in innovative companies in growing industries (e.g. software, health care, life sciences, energy).

One final thought (and plug), if young entrepreneurs like yourselves decided to hire the CSBCB to write your business plan or feasibility study (great idea!), it’s possible for you to get reimbursed up to 75% of our consulting fees (usually less than 5,000$) by the Jeunes Promoteurs program administered by your local CDEC and CLD. This means you essentially get a professionally-written business plan or feasibility study at 25% of the price.
Thank you to my buddy Heri for allowing me to guest post on his blog. As an ex-entrepreneur myself (most people know my old story or can read it here ), I’m happy to help out the community and hopefully offer entrepreneurs something of value.

See ya,