A next-generation stroke intervention startup founded by two medtech veterans took home the audience-voted $2,000 prize at the Communitech Startup Bootcamp Founder Showcase on Wednesday night.

Sensible Vascular, co-founded by Kevin Macwan and Purvish Soni, earned top marks from attendees after they pitched a thrombectomy device that can remove brain clots more effectively and safely than current technologies.

“It’s amazing,” said Soni. “It’s really exciting to see that people trust us and what we are doing.”

“We quit our jobs about a month ago, so this is very new,” Macwan told the crowd. “It’s nice to see a lot of this come to fruition. We’ve been at it in my basement, evenings, weekends, trying to take care of this together. We picked a very difficult business to start in, which is medtech.”

The Startup Bootcamp Showcase, hosted at Communitech in downtown Kitchener, featured three-minute, no-slide pitches from 12 early-stage founders and founding teams. The June 18 event marked the culmination of a six-week program designed to help entrepreneurs validate their ideas and develop their go-to-market strategies.

“You are not alone,” said Sheldon McCormick, CEO at Communitech. “So many friends and family are in your corner, and that’s what we’re trying to do at Communitech, is to be in your corner as you are building your businesses.”

The Startup Bootcamp launched in fall 2024 to support first-time founders and early-stage startups. Over six weeks, participants worked with Communitech coaches and experts on customer discovery, business model design, market sizing and more.

“Getting up on this stage in front of a room of this size is something that takes a lot of courage,” said Angela Bruce, Startup Program Manager at Communitech. “And for some of the founders tonight, this is the first opportunity to do so. Over the past few months, I’ve had the privilege to work closely with them, getting to see their growth, drive, commitment to their businesses, and each other.”

“One of the best parts of the Showcase is seeing the community come together to support early-stage entrepreneurs,” said Christina Wood, VP of Founder Programs at Communitech. “In the future, we’d love to see even more fellow scale-up and startup founders in the room, cheering on their up-and-coming peers. That kind of support is what makes this ecosystem so special.”

Founders solving problems they’ve lived through

One pitch came from Taiwo Oyewole, founder of Vuga Tech, who’s taking on car theft with a tire-deflation device that kicks in automatically if a vehicle is stolen.

“Every six minutes, a car gets stolen in Canada,” Oyewole said. “Your car may not ever be stolen, but [it may impact] you one way or another, through increased insurance premiums.”

The Vuga system can immobilize a vehicle within minutes of unauthorized movement, giving owners peace of mind and making it harder for thieves to get away.

Another pitch came from Puneet Gupta, founder of Aequify, a fintech startup helping expats with cross-border finances, taxes and credit systems. He spoke about his personal experience moving to Canada and having to pay several thousand dollars in taxes.

“It’s not the money that hurts the most. It’s the constant stress, late nights and the feeling that the system doesn’t really understand what it means to live in a different country,” Gupta said. “That was a turning point for me. I left a well-paying job and built Aequify.”

Meet the founders

Rounding out the showcase with Sensible Vascular, Vuga Tech and Aequify were the following Startup Bootcamp participants:

• Deepika & Ajay Mishra, Anandit – An AI and AR-powered party planning app that helps people design and visualize events in their space, manage guests and vendors, and stay on budget, all in one place.
  
  
• Mustafa Nazary, Autobud Inc. – A one-stop app for getting quotes from mechanics, booking vehicle service, and keeping track of your car’s full maintenance history.
  
  
• Dhruv Sharma, Convolve AI Inc. – A computer vision startup using AI to analyze video footage in real time, turning it into insights for safety, compliance, traffic management and more.
  
  
• Dinesh Kumar, DINI – A mobile app that scans product barcodes and gives instant, personalized insights into ingredient quality, nutrition, and safety recalls to help users shop smarter and stay healthier.
  
  
• Mikhai Wilson & Victor Okon, DLICIO – A gamified, video-based food delivery app that eliminates fees for restaurants and drivers. Think TikTok meets Uber Eats, but without the markups.
  
  
• Emily Tell, IdeaTilt – A “business-in-a-box” knowledge platform that gives employees the right answers in the moment using customizable, AI-supported operating procedures and real-time guidance.
  
  
• Tomiwa Olajide, MissionSync – Software that helps growing companies execute on strategy by linking daily work to big-picture goals with better alignment.
  
  
• Mahdi (Nick) Sabamehr, ParentZ.io – A parenting app that supports emotional wellness and education through daily mood check-ins, micro-learning, and content from experts.
  
  
• Shreyonshi Mishra, Saga - A community-first social platform designed to transform how people connect around events, making every gathering more meaningful, curated, and inclusive. From intimate meetups to vibrant local happenings, Saga empowers organizers and attendees to build real relationships beyond the RSVP.

City support strengthens the startup community

In 2024, the City of Kitchener renewed a $500,000 annual investment in Communitech to support early-stage founders, in-person programming and equity-deserving entrepreneurs.

“Today is about building momentum for startups, for our innovation community and for the future of innovation right here in downtown Kitchener and across Canada,” said Mayor Berry Vrbanovic. “This was a community of manufacturing. It’s now a community of manufacturing new innovations.”

For many of the founders, the showcase was just the beginning.

“We’re building our clinical and regulatory strategy, working with manufacturers in the U.S. and getting to the MVP (minimum viable product) stage,” said Macwan, whose team has since been accepted into The Forge business incubator, built by McMaster University. “It’s great to see some external validation like this. That’s the emotional part for me. I think what we’re doing is going to be meaningful.”