May 29, 2023: Decisions, decisions

What is Spruce?

Spruce is an AI-powered loan origination and decisioning software that can collect, analyze, underwrite, and monitor small business data.

What is the insight/reason that you launched this business?
While working for a venture debt lender, we found the applicants often weren't clear on their businesses’ financial health and their ability to take on debt safely. That meant that we, the lender, had to do the manual grunt work to analyze each applicant.

Spruce automates this process by integrating with the software and bank accounts used by the applicants. Spruce generates an AI-powered financial score that helps lenders evaluate applications in minutes.

How did you get started?
We created the software while working for a debt lender and piloted the software with our existing portfolio. Through the success of the pilot project internally, we started sharing the software with a specific group of lenders. Recently, we have opened this software up to the public.

How did you find your Co-Founders?
We met back in undergrad. After 10 years of building our own companies separately, we reconnected with a shared passion to use AI to solve financial industry pain points.

How did you get your first customer?
Our first external customer, who we still work with today, is an innovative Government of Canada micro-lending agency. We met through internal contacts and instantly connected over the desire to improve the challenges of lending.

Any interesting metrics you’d like to share?
So far, we have over 1,000 applications processed and over 200 businesses funded through the platform.

Who are your customers and how do you help them?
We help government, traditional, and non-traditional lenders use data to help inform and/or automate their internal processes.

What is your biggest victory? What setback(s) did you overcome to get here?
Building the technology. I have a huge appreciation for our engineers who created the platform. From data normalization to predictive modeling, there was no shortage of complex problems we had to solve with the build-out.

What piece of advice would you like to pass on to other Founders?
Even though founders are building separate products, the core problems we experience are shared amongst many. I can not understate how important conversations with other founders have been for helping Spruce grow.

What are the highlights of working at your company?
As a young company, every decision - and person - has a meaningful impact on the company.

Learn more about Spruce and the Intuit Prosperity Accelerator: Toronto here

The weather hasn’t been the only thing heating up over the past month - the ecosystem has been revived and seemingly brought back to life as well.

With an array of raises, acquisitions, (and a bit of bad news), the ecosystem is pushing out headlines, stories, and chatter that we have been unpacking each week.

Here are the top stories we have enjoyed in the month of May:

A Super raise to kick off the news of the month

A little bit of bad news to put things into perspective

There’s always an upside to bad news

One, two, three pieces of acquisition news

Here’s who is ‘hopping’ into the carbon capture game

Listen to these episodes in full from the past month, wherever you listen to your podcasts. We break down everything we’ve been seeing in easy-to-digest, 30 min episodes that you can take anywhere.

Are you a Founder? McMillan wants to hook you up with some exciting giveaways. Fill out this survey to learn more and share your story

Building a team, strengthening your brand, and how to reach (and secure) millions of customers. This is what you'll learn from our Founders Journey Series - a brand new episode drops this week!

Did any of the biggest science stories for 2023 actually play out yet?

How AI is revolutionizing dating and taking the pressure off

Product Lead, Spellbook (Remote)

Why is this cool? Spellbook is on a mission to make legal services more affordable & accessible while helping lawyers do more of the work they love. In this role, you will be responsible for developing a deep understanding of our customers and using those insights to develop the product roadmap.

Sales Development Representative, Getware (Vancouver | Remote)

Why is this cool? This is a unique opportunity to join a growing startup and has an important seat at the table as they strive to hit their growth milestones. You will be joining a small, tight-knit team that is passionate about making product management efficient.

*Reply to this email and let us know the jobs you'd like to see

Check out the interesting content, events, and happenings for the community here:

• TechTO Social | Vancouver | TONIGHT: Get ready to connect and meet new people in Vancouver! We're excited to be back! You’ll hear from the Founder of buddybuild Dennis Pilarinos , learn from the CEO of Getware Grant Munro, and much more! You can also expect 100+ technologists and founders to fill the space for an evening of great conversation and to learn and grow together!

• TechTO: Together | June 5, 2023: Learn from the top Founders and creators in Canadian Tech. Whatever your goals are, this event can connect you with like-minded individuals that will help you level up and reach your goals.

• TechTO x OneEleven present: The Summer Social Series | June 26, 2023: A chance to kick off summer with hundreds of founders, technologists, and like-minded individuals (over yummy food and drinks!) More activations and announcements coming soon!

Want to showcase your company, events, and opportunities to 60,000 subscribers across the Canadian Tech Eco-system? Reach out to [email protected] to learn more!24