Decoding Entrepreneurs

My guest for this episode is Sumit Ajwani, founder and executive producer at Makers, a collective of producers who bring together designers, musicians, writers, developers, film makers, directors, and many other creators to make anything. From movies and experiential installations, to animation and digital campaigns, Sumit and his industry experts embrace the challenge of answering the uncommon ask for global brands.

The vision Sumit developed for Makers is a complete rewrite of the creative and production process in the marketing industry.  Makers flips the model by replacing the entire edifice with one person: a Producer. A Producer works with a client to identify exactly what they need. With the Producer and Client working together, they bring the right specialists they need at the right moment to bring a creative idea to life. In this model, the Producer becomes the entrepreneur and the work becomes human-centric.

Sumit’s disruptive model, in less than 5 years, has seen Makers grow from 2 people to 50+ producers in Toronto, LA and New York, making it the largest collective of Producers in North America.

Makers has become a force in Canada and an emerging force on the world stage, tackling that which seems impossible, using collaboration and unconventional thinking to conceive, execute, and deliver projects for clients as diverse as WWF-Canada, Amazon Prime, and Habitat for Humanity.

My guest for this episode is Robin Kovitz, CEO of Baskits, Canada's preeminent gift delivery service company, which designs, manufacturers and delivers unique and luxurious gifts across Canada and the US.

As a sought-after speaker and commentator on “Entrepreneurship through Acquisition” and the topic of “Mompreneurship” Robin frequently serves as a guest lecturer at both the Yale School of Management and the Harvard Business School.

She and/or Baskits have been featured in a number of leading publications, including: Forbes, House & Home, Elle Canada, Canadian Business, Huffington Post, Style at Home and on Global News, Your Morning Show.

Robin currently serves as a consultant to the Admissions Marketing team at the Harvard Business School and as a member of Young Presidents’ Organization.

In 2017, she was recognized as a Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 award winner.

You can find Robin at:

My guest for this episode is Matt Orlove, founder & CEO of ORLOVE. 

No stranger to live music events and entertainment, Matt is responsible for creating, crafting and partnering on some of the most sought after parties throughout the U.S. and in 40 markets spanning over 250 parties per year; including events such as Wicked Paradise, Panic in L.A., BarCrawlerZ, Dreamboat, Daft BRUNCH, just to name a few.

Matt’s 15 plus year background in entertainment and lifestyle events has helped catapult ORLOVE into a multi-million dollar, premium GO-TO BRAND, synonymous with world renowned music, artists and venues, and continues to expand nationally and internationally, making ORLOVE one of the fastest growing event brands globally.  And all of this in just a few short years since moving from New York City to Los Angeles and founding his own company in 2014.

ORLOVE's commitment to the audience’s overall experience has been the key to the company’s success. “It’s all about how guests feel when they come to one of our parties and how they connect with the music and the ambience. We want them to leave their world and become a part of a whole new one, even if for just a short period of time."

Covid 19 has obviously had a big impact across the whole entertainment industry, and I’ll talk to Matt about how ORLOVE has responded by diversifying into new and exciting channels, and is bridging the gap between music genres, fans and artists worldwide.

Welcome to part 2 of this special 2 part episode of Decoding Entrepreneurs, featuring my guest is Ben Goodwin.  If you haven't yet listened to Part 1, I encourage you to do so first.

Ben is the cofounder, CEO and formulator at Olipop PBC, which manufacturers a line of premium carbonated soft drinks that feature prebiotics, botanicals, and plant fiber in a low calorie and low sugar format.

Even though Ben isn’t Canadian, but rather a native Californian, his story intrigued me so much that I had to have him on as a guest, as it will no doubt also resonate with many of you.  Ben’s primary passion is to bridge the gap between niche cutting-edge health trends and mainstream consumer needs and to increase the impact and accessibility of products in the health and wellness space.

He’s built three different formulation and fermentation labs, and has formulated over 30 products from concept to commercialization and beyond.

The other reason this episode is special is that Ben and I delve into some of his early childhood experiences with abuse, depression, and mental health, and the life-shaping, and certainly the transformative journey that Ben has taken.

Ben has clearly overcome those early challenges, and the hope is that any of you listening that may have or are still facing similar challenges can feel inspired and empowered with what’s possible, and apply some of things Ben did to overcome and accomplish the things he has.

You can find Ben at:

Welcome to part 1 of a special 2 part episode of Decoding Entrepreneurs, featuring my guest is Ben Goodwin.  Ben is the cofounder, CEO and formulator at Olipop PBC, which manufacturers a line of premium carbonated soft drinks that feature prebiotics, botanicals, and plant fiber in a low calorie and low sugar format.

Even though Ben isn’t Canadian, but rather a native Californian, his story intrigued me so much that I had to have him on as a guest, as it will no doubt also resonate with many of you.  Ben’s primary passion is to bridge the gap between niche cutting-edge health trends and mainstream consumer needs and to increase the impact and accessibility of products in the health and wellness space.

He’s built three different formulation and fermentation labs, and has formulated over 30 products from concept to commercialization and beyond.

The other reason this episode is special is that Ben and I delve into some of his early childhood experiences with abuse, depression, and mental health, and the life-shaping, and certainly the transformative journey that Ben has taken.

Ben has clearly overcome those early challenges, and the hope is that any of you listening that may have or are still facing similar challenges can feel inspired and empowered with what’s possible, and apply some of things Ben did to overcome and accomplish the things he has.

You can find Ben at:

My guest for this episode is Canadian serial entrepreneur Daniel Assouline, CEO of Avanquest Group, one of the world’s top 10 leading software publishers.

Prior to joining Avanquest, Daniel was CEO of Adaware, a world-renowned Canadian anti-malware & security software provider.

In 2018, Adaware and its group of companies merged with Avanquest, a subsidiary of the French publically listed company Claranova, creating a new global internet and software publishing powerhouse. .

Daniel is also Principal at DLign, which focuses on real-estate development, superyacht design, and product design.

You can find Daniel at:

My guest in this episode is Canadian serial technology entrepreneur and investor Nicholas Reichenbach, Founder and CEO of Flow Water Inc.

Nicholas is a Canadian serial entrepreneur & investor, who’s created and built numerous businesses that have disrupted the status quo across consumer goods, digital distribution, entertainment, hospitality and social media.

Launching Flow in 2014, he set out to disrupt the water industry, which had remained largely unchanged for years.

Earlier this year, Flow Alkaline Spring Water raised $45 million in a funding round, with many famous entertainment and celebrity investors, including singer Post Malone, former baseball player Chase Utley, singer Shawn Mendes and his manager Andrew Gertler, and artist managers Austin Rosen and Dave Holmes. Private equity firm Ruttenberg Gordon Investments also participated in the funding round.

Flow is aiming to sell more than 100 million units this year and has seen 250% year-over-year growth.

It’s sold in 25,000 stores globally, and the brand is hoping to have a consumer base of 20 million by 2021.

You can find Nicholas at:

My guest in this episode is Montreal-based veteran tech entrepreneur and investor, Pascal Pilon, CEO of LANDR.

I'm Tomas Schmidt, and welcome to Decoding Entrepreneurs - a series of one to one conversations with successful Canadian entrepreneurs, founders & innovators about their personal journeys and how they achieved success.

You can find Pascal at:

My guest in this episode is Monette Malewsky, President and CEO at M Bacal Group.

Monette is recognized as one of the leading advisors in the insurance industry.  In 2014, she was named as one of the 50 most influential women in the business by the Insurance and Investment Journal.

Monette is President of Montreal Relève, a non-profit organization that works to prepare the next generation of Montreal business leaders, as well as the Board of Directors of Immigrant Investisseurs IQ. She also sits on the boards of Investissement Quebec, Anges Quebec Capital, the Canadian Friends of the Hebrew University and the International Women’s Forum (IWF) International Board.

She has been honoured with many awards.  In recent years, she was named “Top de la Diversité “ by Médiamosiaque, received an honourary fellowship from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, was a recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee and was named a Women of Action by the Israel Cancer Research Fund.

In April 2015 Monette was awarded le Prix Inspiration- Andrée Corriveau by the Association des femmes en finance du Québec (AFFQ) and in September 2015 she was named one of 8 incontournable women in Finance. This past year she was profiled twice in the French review Finance et Investissement.

You can reach Monette at:

My guest in this episode is Ian Jeffrey, Co-Founder and CEO at Breathe Life.  Ian is an entrepreneur with 20 years of experience in Montreal and Silicon Valley and an Advisor and Angel Investor to many early-stage startups.

I'm Tomas Schmidt, and welcome to Decoding Entrepreneurs - a series of one to one conversations with successful Canadian entrepreneurs, founders & innovators about their personal journeys and how they achieved success.

You can find Ian at:

My guest in this episode is Montreal-based serial technology entrepreneur Adrian Schauer, Founder and CEO of Alayacare.   

I'm Tomas Schmidt, and welcome to Decoding Entrepreneurs - a series of one to one conversations with successful Canadian entrepreneurs, founders & innovators about their personal journeys and how they achieved success.

You can find Adrian at: