Innovative Projects Realized

Process optimization and Spectroscopic Analysis of Diamond-Like Carbon Films

Diamond like carbon (DLC) is an amorphous form of carbon with a high fraction of diamondlike
(sp3) bonds. DLC thin films have many attractive attributes including extraordinary
hardness, enhanced lubrication and wear resistance properties. Aurora Scientific Corp. is the
provider of advanced vacuum coating systems based on its patented physical vapor
deposition (PVD) technology. Aurora is seeking to improve their DLC thin film deposition
technology by optimizing the conditions required to deposit high quality DLC coatings. We
propose to assist Aurora in this development by monitoring the film characteristics during
growth through in situ Raman spectroscopic analysis and optical emission spectroscopy and
to correlate the thin film deposition conditions with desirable physical properties. The
information gathered will help Aurora to implement an integrated OES/Raman process
controller system into its commercial PVD vacuum coating systems.

MBA Summer Internship

This project will require the intern to work on business development and operations activities for the organization. Business development activities would include conducting relevant market research and developing product roadmap. Operations related activities could include developing costing models and product management responsibilities.

Business Operations and Strategy Intern

AMNIe was built to address the systemic challenges through a cross-sector collaborative approach to innovation and scaling of solutions that address economic, environmental and social challenges. The primary role of the Business Strategy & Operations team will be to coordinate the expansion of AMNIE’s growing Expert Network by liaising with the business partners, working with our UX/UI experts to develop the front-end intake and communications channels as well as administering the CRM databases and enabling the deployment of fit-for-purpose digital collaboration and relationship management software.

Ivey Business Strategy Internship

The building of client relationships start with the company’s in-house Sales team, who have traditionally employed methods that required significant in-person interaction with potential clients. With the social distancing measures that are in place due to COVID-19, much of what the Sales team has traditionally done to engage with customers must now evolve. The challenge at hand is to: 1) research and evaluate preferred methods of communication to existing customers, 2) reassess the traditional sales methodologies of the current Sales team, and 3) evaluate new methods of communicating product information to a digital and largely work-from-home client base.

Corporate Finance & Business Development – Summer Analyst

NIBC Live Media creates case studies and financial models for business students and professionals looking to work in investment banking. The scope of the Corporate Finance & Business Development internship encompasses three components.
1) CORPORATE FINANCE: Internal Finance, Project Budgeting and Financial Reporting
2) TRAINING MATERIALS: Corporate Finance Cases, Financial Modeling, Management
3) BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT: E-Commerce Platform, Partnerships, Marketing Strategies

Business Strategy Internship

Stealth’s current portfolio represents a small percentage of potential market reach and revenue. Stealth Monitoring is now looking to expand their existing enterprise accounts as well as secure new accounts. Additionally, Stealth is facing capacity restraints to explore and analyze top prospects in their core and secondary verticals. Under the direction of the VP of Business Development, I will be a direct contributor to the marketing and sales team and implementing this enterprise account strategy.

Marketing & Communications Analysis for the YMCA of Southwestern Ontario

With the global pandemic creating uncertainty for the future of the YMCA of Southwestern Ontario, the organization is in need of powerful insights from data analytics more than ever. The intern will have access to large amounts of historical data containing information concerning the partner organization’s main pillars: health, fitness and aquatics activities, childcare, and camp, as well as specific data pertaining to social media marketing and email communications. Using software tools such as Microsoft Excel, R, and Tableau, the intern will extract and present business insights for the YMCA marketing and communications team. Through the discovery of the most popular activities by demographics and branch location, the organization will be able to decide which activities to stop running post-pandemic, allowing them to conserve resources while maintaining the satisfaction of their customers. By determining who participates in two or more departments within the association, and during which seasons, the team will be able to draw conclusions surrounding when and whom to market other departments’ offerings.

Operations Intern

As an Operations Intern I will be responsible for:
• Driving growth by improving sales and developing strong relationships with customers and key stakeholders.
• Work closely with CEO and COO to lead the prospecting of new clients.
• Attract interest in products and services by becoming proficient in paid advertising, lead generation and email campaign creation
• Develop and manage projects as required, including presentations and projects related to sales and conversion rate optimization
I will be trained to develop in the following areas:
• Leadership development
• Collaboration and communication in a cross-functional team to design and build new products
• Ideation, market validation and iteration in developing new products and services
•Proficiency in data analysis and the ability to make data-driven decisions
• Sales training and customer service training
• Developing a technical stack of skills that includes proficiency with software including but not limited to Slack, Asana, Thinkific, Acuity, Mailchimp, Coda, Facebook Advertising and Google Advertising

AWE Technology Development Project – The Virtual History of Fort York

The intern will provide research support and analysis to assist Divani’s entry into the Augmented Reality industry, where Divani may play the role of technology supplier, service provider, or provider of creative AR products. The intern will investigate existing AR technologies, products, and services that currently available or in development. This insight will be used to identify potential business opportunities in industries that are investing in AR as well as industries that may have practical use for AR products or services but are currently untapped or being underserved. Potential competition will also be identified. The research and analysis conducted by the intern will draw on business methods and approaches that are commonly practiced in early stages of product innovation, notably ideation and concept testing, scoping, voice of customer, and competitive analysis.
The intern will also be responsible for assistance in the development of a commercialization plan…TOBECONT’D

Integrated Amino Analyzer

Develop and design a fully automated and simple to operate amino acid analyzer capable of detecting with high degree of sensitivity the broadest range of amino acid metabolites or molecular structures found in living cells and chemical compounds. Analyzing the makeup of these structures is often the core to understanding the cause of human health conditions.

The project objective is to design an affordable and easy to use analyzer thereby making it more accessible to a larger human health sciences community and research laboratories. Current solutions are costly and require specialized skills which limits the research and advancement to that of the few large well funded organizations or research institutions.

Increasing accessibility of amino acid analysis will increase the research into existing and emerging human health issues thereby enhancing our knowledge and accelerating potential cures.

Effect of neuromuscular electrical stimulation using the StimaWELL 120MTRS system on multifidus muscle morphology and function in patients with chronic low back pain

Chronic low-back pain (CLBP) is a significant health issue in North America. CLBP patients demonstrate structural changes to and reduced function of the multifidus muscle, which is important to low-back health. Neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) is a treatment used to improve pain and function in low-back pain patients, but is frequently painful. Our partner has developed a device (the StimaWELL 120MTRS Stimulation Mat) that is less painful for patients, but its effects on multifidus structure and function are unknown. Therefore, our research goal is to determine whether this device can improve the structure and function of the multifidus in CLBP patients. Our partner will benefit by having access to the ultrasound and MRI measurements that we will provide, and by having the efficacy of his device evaluated in a clinical trial.

Automatic matching of service offers to calls for tenders

The process for responding to tenders is very long, arduous and involves many repetitive tasks. Among these, it is necessary to read the invitation to tender in order to find the different requirements, important dates, legal obligations, constraints of presentation of the response, etc. All of these factors are used for the prequalification of a tender and for the drafting of the tender. These requirements are generally expressed in the form of free text. Automating the task of identifying these requirements cannot therefore be done easily using keywords and rather requires more complex linguistic analysis, thanks to automatic language processing.
The main objective of this research is to automatically extract the requirements of a call for tenders to speed up and simplify the process of responding to calls for tenders.