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Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1365499
W I N N E R CAROLE HERDER P R E S I D E N T , C A V A L L O H O R S E & R I D E R CAROLE HERDER LEFT Vancouver in 1993 to get away from it all. Her children's cloth- ing business, whose clients included Holt Renfrew, Nord- strom and Saks Fifth Avenue, had suffered in the wake of the North American Free Trade Agreement. So Herder and her young family moved to the Sunshine Coast town of Rob- erts Creek, where she took up horse riding. If that sounds idyllic, it wasn't always so fun for the horses. Herder, who had no preconceived ideas about things equestrian, noticed that it was considered acceptable for them to suffer from hoof-related ailments. Having acquired her own horses and founded a business that made saddle pads to help combat those problems, she zeroed in on the hoof itself. Why did the animals have to wear metal shoes instead of going barefoot? "It was like an epiphany one day when I said, I cannot allow this metal to be nailed into live tissue on my horses' feet anymore." So Edmonton-raised Herder set out to find an alternative. "Had I known then what I know now, I don't think I'd have had the courage to do it," she says. "Because there was so much opposition, and it was really hard, and it took years to change people's minds." In 2004, Herder and Cavallo Horse & Rider CEO Greg Giles, who has a manufacturing background in industrial work safety footwear, began develop- ing a hoof boot that provided comfort, safety and traction— and was easy to put on and take MAY 2021 BCBUSINESS 21 INNOVATOR R U N N E R - U P ANNE HUNGER C O - F O U N D E R + C O O , G L Ü X K I N D T E C H N O L O G I E S BEFORE THEY became new parents early last year, Anne Hunger and her partner went hunting for a stroller. They didn't like what they saw. "It became apparent pretty quickly that strollers are not very smart," recalls Hunger, who worked as an adviser for real estate management consultant Colliers Project Leaders after moving to Vancouver from Germany in 2017. Or very safe: every hour in the U.S., two stroller-related accidents send kids to the emer- gency department. Doing some market research, Hunger and three male co-founders launched GlüxKind Technologies. Their stroller, now at the prototype stage, combines artificial intelligence and robotics with traditional design. Its features include an alert if the seatbelt isn't on properly, says Hunger, who previously helped Adidas and auto giant Daimler to create workplaces that foster innovation. If your child is walking or in your arms, the stroller follows you autono- mously, she adds. It also has a push-and-brake assistant: "Our stroller would not run away because it senses the distance between the user and the stroller and would always stay within arms' reach." GlüxKind, whose name means "lucky child," plans to launch in Canada and the U.S. this year. The company–which will focus its marketing on tech hubs, whose residents are more likely to be early adopters–is part of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sandbox Innovation Program. Along with pre-seed funding, the team of 12 has secured financial and other sup- port from the National Research Council of Canada. Because the smart stroller's cameras track the pedestrian environment, which is tough for robots to navigate, Hunger can see spinning off a data business aimed at companies working on other applications that call for sidewalk autonomy. GlüxKind could also give parents with disabilities new freedom, she says. "Everybody wants to explore the world with their little ones, but not everybody is able to do so right now." –N.R. off. For the shock-absorbing sole, they settled on thermo- plastic polyurethane. Herder got some assistance from Silvana Rivadeneira, a former designer for B.C. shoemaker John Fluevog. "She helped me look at ways to design it so that it was appealing and yet still functional." Then came the hard part: selling the boots. "It was pure perseverance," Edmonton- raised Herder says of launching Cavallo's first product in 2006. "Sometimes I would go to these horse shows, and I'd have one or two people in this tent." But the boots—aimed at recreational trail riders, most of whom are women—gained traction by word of mouth, says Herder, who promoted her speaking events in equestrian magazines. Several years ago, she got some valuable publicity by convincing mounted police officers to try the product. Cavallo now sells its hoof boots, which are made in Asia, in more than 25 countries. Although it remains the No. 1 brand, several competitors have entered the field. Herder takes that as a compliment. "We feel we're still the best boot on the market, and we absolutely are in terms of marketing and distribution," she says. "I challenge anyone to come up against us."