Just Two Days Left to Apply to York Region’s YEDIInstitute Fall 2014 Cohort

betakit.com
By Joseph Czikk
Aug. 13, 2014

York Region’s YEDIInstitute incubator is giving potential startups until Friday night for its call to applications for the Fall 2014 cohort.

Based out of the Schulich School of Business at York University, YEDInstitute calls itself a “rigorous, prestigious and free start-up accelerator where innovators will receive practical training, high-caliber education, and mentorship in order to transform their ideas into successful businesses.”

We previously wrote about the organization back in January when the very first cohort commenced. YEDI made it clear that it was intent on helping a wide variety of businesses.

The program is 12 weeks of education and theory that’s applied in seminars. Each week includes a four-hour lecture and cohort members participate in six total seminars.

YEDI doesn’t take any equity from startups and they don’t give them any capital, but for-profit startups pitching on Friday have a legitimate shot of investors to give them up to $500,000. The non-profit startups primarily pitch to potential sponsors, who also wield considerable potential capital.

The selection process, said Ayrapetyan, is quite rigorous, with a selection committee comprised of members of the Schulich Executive Education Centre and other parters and supporters. Potential ventures are judged on four criteria: market feasibility, innovative value, investor appeal and social impact. YEDI is not out to accept any small business, but companies that are not only solving a problem but actually changing the structures in place in a given sector.

In July the program graduated its second batch of entrepreneurs.

Applications for the new cohort will cease at 11:59 on Friday night.