With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1512670
THE WORLD OF ONLINE DATA COLLECTION feels shrouded in mystery—and, often, that's by design. "You'd be shocked how many browser extensions exist to change the theme on your Google Chrome, or make your mouse clicker pink, and are actually tracking what people do on the internet without telling them," says Aanikh Kler. "It's quite a wide- spread problem." But Surf, a privacy-first browser extension created by Kler's co-founder, Swish Goswami, is all about transparency. According to Kler, the business serves both enter- prises (via protecting them from the legal ramifications of collecting data illegally) and consumers (via making sure that their data is not being tracked without consent). For example, Surf is working with Riot Games—the American develop- er of League of Legends—for the LoL World Championship, the world's largest esports event. Surf will ask for participant and audience feedback and data in exchange for prizes (for example, an all-expenses paid trip to next year's event). Surf's enterprise clients use the data col- lected to improve their formatting, re-target audiences for relevant promotions and create more revenue-generation opportunities. "The audience that we're able to drive to these ini- tiatives is much more engaged and interested than a general audience," explains Kler. Riot isn't the only big fish in Surf's proverbial pond: since it was founded in 2019, the Vancouver-based company has worked with Amazon, EA, Netflix, the NBA and the NFL. "We're really trying to push this idea of responsible data collection into more and more enterprises," says Kler, adding that new features that allow businesses to run their own independent data programs are on the horizon. "Our hope is to continue building products that allow these large companies to get the data they need, but to do so in a way that is not only compliant with privacy standards, but also equitable for the consumer." —A.H. EARLIER THIS YEAR, AT THE OLD age of 23, Arnav Mishra won this magazine's 30 Under 30 competi- tion. It's very rare for someone that young to be overseeing more than 20 employees, but that was the case with Mishra, who founded Dyne, the Vancouver- based platform that connects foodies with local restaurants and each other. So I'm somewhat sur- prised when I call him in October and he says that the company has "grown significantly." To be fair, the employee headcount has stayed roughly the same (Dyne has added four people over the past few months), but the app's popularity (it's routinely in the top 10 among Canadian food apps) and its reach (expansion to Alberta, Ontario and the U.S.) are real. Perhaps the most surpris- ing aspect of all is the personal growth that Mishra has been ex- periencing. "I've stepped into the shoes of an advisor and mentor to startups," he says over a Zoom screen. "I've been angel invest- ing in some new companies, giving small cheques between $3,000 and $10,000, nothing too crazy. What people don't realize is that for young entrepreneurs, sometimes $3,000 is a lot. You can set up a website, hire folks to build you a prototype, all that." Mishra is taking a similar brick- Aanikh Kler COO AND CO-FOUNDER, SURF Arnav Mishra FOUNDER AND CEO, DYNE TECHNOLOGIES by-brick approach to Dyne's expansion. "When we go any- where, we hire local," he says. "When we went to Alberta, we partnered with the Alberta Hospitality Association, Calgary Economic Development, Edmonton Un- limited. We hired co-op students from the universities and partner with the governments on tech- nology adoption programs because Dyne is a machine- learning software. It helps govern- ments generate more money for the economy." Dyne's entire team is under the age of 25 but Mishra is clearly intent on growing up fast. His five-year plan includes becoming an "elder" in the food tech indus- try. "We want to be providing in- sights to players in the industry so they can transform their services and meet the challenges of their customers." —N.C. 41 BC BU S I N E S S .C A J A N U A R Y 2 0 24