The Canadian Explorers

The voice for founders in Canada's most critical industries.

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

Canada has the longest coastline in the world. Uncrewed platforms are needed to monitor and protect it. 🇨🇦

Mostar Labs is building Lilypad, a modular floating platform designed to charge electric vessels, power remote equipment and support maritime surveillance. The platform can be deployed as a standalone unit or scaled “like LEGO” depending on demand.

Founder and CEO Meiz Majdoub Jr. spent 26 years as a naval engineering officer in the Royal Canadian Navy and founded the Navy’s technology management program. Now, he is building to address the gaps that he saw during service.

“I found it difficult as a veteran to watch from the sidelines. I wanted to contribute where I could.”

Bootstrapped since 2022, Mostar Labs is now preparing for its first capital raise. Read the 18th Explorer Spotlight, “Power Beyond the Dock”: https://t.co/qdIvB4v7r1

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

Today, ENVGO and @OceanRobotics signed an MOU at DEFSEC Atlantic in Halifax to advance Canadian uncrewed maritime surveillance. 🇨🇦
The collaboration will connect ENVGO’s high-speed hydrofoiling vessels and Open Ocean Robotics’ long-endurance, solar-powered vessels through XplorerView, a shared command-and-control platform.

I previously spoke with ENVGO CEO Dr. Mike Peasgood for The Canadian Explorers:
Flying Sea Drones | Dr. Mike Peasgood, ENVGO — Explorer Spotlight #5
https://t.co/MjWAbvochK

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

The Canadian Explorers is proud to announce Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP as a Supporting Partner. As one of Canada's leading business law firms, Blakes advises companies across the defence ecosystem through a multidisciplinary team that combines legal excellence with firsthand military and government experience. Thank you to Matthew McLeod and the entire Blakes team for making this partnership possible.

Learn more: https://t.co/owMeO3c6gR

@BlakesLaw @TheCadExplorers

[The Canadian Explorers @TheCadExplorers]

In an environment with strict regulation, risk aversion, and a lack of ambition, speed, and capital, keeping a company in Canada has required bravery, leadership and purpose.
Yet, these same traits are what make a founder, or an explorer, great.

https://t.co/jtrlDDsdT2

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

In nearly every interview on The Canadian Explorers, I ask, “Why build in Canada?” because for a long time, building in Canada has not been the obvious choice. To answer why some of the world’s most critical technologies are being built in the North, I compiled selected responses from 17 of Canada’s modern explorers.

https://t.co/e2mAmQNrQ2

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

Juno Industries (@junoindustries), a Canadian defence technology company, unveils GUARDIAN and LOGAN, a sensor system and software platform designed to help military personnel detect threats and make decisions in remote environments like the Arctic. 🇨🇦
I spoke with the founder and CEO, @hunterscharfe, about the technology, testing with the Canadian Armed Forces, and what comes next.

Subscribe to https://t.co/qOoGkJ98FF to keep up to date with the founders building in Canada’s most critical industries.

Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
00:15 Juno’s two flagship products
00:37 GUARDIAN: distributed sensors and threat detection
01:33 LOGAN: sovereign data and command-and-control
02:56 Canadian Armed Forces testing and feedback
04:24 Commercialization and what comes next

GUARDIAN combines proprietary sensors and local computing, designed to operate disconnected and without GPS. LOGAN brings data from multiple sensors and systems into a single operating picture and can also integrate with existing command-and-control systems.
Juno says an earlier version of GUARDIAN was tested by the Canadian Armed Forces. Both products have completed beta field-testing and are now in the pre-commercialization stage.

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

Daedal Systems, a Toronto-based startup, raises US$4.035M to build the measurement infrastructure for the global fusion industry. 🇨🇦
I spoke with Canadian founder and CEO Henry Gould about what this funding means for the company.

Daedal is building standardized systems for measuring plasma, the superheated gas at the core of fusion machines.
The company is backed by all-Canadian VCs, led by @OMERSVentures, with participation from @GarageCapital, @PanacheVC, @ripple_ventures, and @MaRSIAF, along with a group of angel investors.

The funding will go towards building the company’s first three diagnostic systems and deploying prototypes under contract with pilot clients.

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

The Canadian Explorers is giving founders the voice that Canadian startups have never had.
I am sharing the most interesting stories in Canadian deep-tech, defence, and critical industries. Often, https://t.co/qOoGkJ8AQ7 is the only place on the internet with information on these companies.

Canadians need a platform to be bold, ambitious, and to chase world-changing ideas. If you support this mission, please subscribe to the newsletter and retweet or share.
https://t.co/ZVsbobRNUq

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

In the age of low-cost and attritable systems, wood may be finding a renewed role in the military.

In the second founder-written essay on The Canadian Explorers, Stuart Lodge, co-founder and CEO of Lodge Systems, traces Canada’s history of shaping war with timber and how we can use our geography to our advantage in modern warfare.

“Twice, the wood to fight a war came out of Canadian forests. Those forests are still standing.”
Materials of Attrition, by Stuart Lodge:
https://t.co/dnN2SxZ9EY

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

"I came back home and haven’t left since. I’m very proud to be doing what I know I’m good at and what the country needs."

@astrorahul_ , @Nord_Space
https://t.co/Zmzj3laK2m

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

"What I found is that the more ambitious you are, the more people will match that ambition."

Hugh Kolias, Canada Rocket Company
https://t.co/FmQmKz1lUl

[Ethan @EthanJMarcoux]

“I don’t need a heavy launch spaceport to launch from. I can launch from a forest.”

Bachar Elzein, Reaction Dynamics
https://t.co/ed5PO2LICP